


Promises Rewritten

by BenevolentErrancy



Series: Made and Broken [2]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Asexual Spectrum, F/M, M/M, Multi, Victim Blaming, abuse recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-25
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-04-11 04:35:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 14
Words: 32,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4421576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BenevolentErrancy/pseuds/BenevolentErrancy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Soulmates: proof that humanity was always meant to work together, to be united in differences and bonded through similarities. Enjolras thought he was living the dream of so many when he met his, a man who seemed to be his perfect biological match.  That is, until time wore away the shiny exterior to expose Enjolras to a brutal, inconsolable affair that has left him, for perhaps the first time in his life, feeling truly stranded.</p><p>Stuck between what he has been told his entire life, his previous convictions, reality, and a painful lack of understanding even from people that want to help him, Enjolras finds himself with no choice but to write himself a future apart from the one he had spent his life waiting for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is the sequel to Promises Misconstrued, and I would strongly recommend reading that one first, since a lot of plot and significance is tied to the events in that one. Though if you're looking for the comfort without (as much) hurt, then I guess starting here be as good of a spot as any.
> 
> That being said, this will still be a relatively graphic story and, while I haven't finalized anything yet, will likely involve some pretty explicit discussion and/or flashbacks to various traumatic events, including physical abuse, emotional abuse, and rape, all of which will be referenced frequently at the very least. Please approach with caution.

In some ways, things had changed a lot in the past hour. Courfeyrac had returned but there was no longer any pretense about studying together. They were no longer sitting on the cold kitchen floor but had instead moved to the couch. There was even three cups of tea perfuming the room as they cooled, but they had mostly been made by Courfeyrac as a way for him to keep his hands busy while they’d tried unsuccessfully to coach the story from Enjolras and, when that had failed, while Courfeyrac had quizzed Grantaire on the little he knew.

In other ways, nothing had changed.

It rained still, cold, distant droplets tapping away on the windows like a nosy neighbour peering in, deepening the silence. Enjolras still hadn't explained anything. After pleading for Courfeyrac to make it – whatever _it_ was exactly – stop, he had stayed mostly silent except for the occasional sniffle. He was now curled in on himself, pressed against one arm of the couch. Courfeyrac had originally tried to cuddle him but Enjolras had reacted almost as badly as he had with Grantaire and, with shared looks of unease, Courfeyrac and Grantaire had chosen to give him space, so Courfeyrac was now at the opposite arm of the couch and Grantaire in a chair across the room.

“So… what?  Guillaume has been straight up _beating_ Enjolras?” asked Courfeyrac.  He was fidgeting restlessly in his seat but was likely too worried that getting up and pacing would scare Enjolras, so he tried to satisfy himself by simply bouncing his legs.  Grantaire was trying to resist the desire to kick him.  “Like, was this a one shot deal or has this been going on for a while?”

“Does it matter?” demanded Grantaire.  “He’s fucking _hit_ Enjolras.”

Courfeyrac glared at him.  “Don’t act like I’m some monster who’s trying to excuse this; you think I’m not upset that _my best friend_ has been hurt?  Hurt by his _soulmate_?  I’m trying to understand what the fuck’s going on.  Enjolras?”

But Enjolras didn’t even look up.  If anything his face pressed further against his knees.

“Actually, on that note, I have a question,” said Grantaire.  “He said that he’s already told someone about this, and I’m assuming he means one of the Amis.  It sure as fuck wasn’t me – do you know anything about this?”

“What the _fuck_?” Courfeyrac snarled, and looked like he was a second from jumping to his feet and lunging at Grantaire – instead he seemed to restrain himself, his whole torso twitching bodily and his leg bouncing harder.  “You think if Enjolras came to me and said ‘hey my soulmate’s beating me, no big deal’ I’d be like ‘sweet, you do you, man’?  You think I’d be okay with this?  Actually fuck you.”

Grantaire threw up his hands, his anger climbing with Courfeyrac’s.  With nowhere else to direct it, with Guillaume gone and Enjolras too broken up to even consider leaving and hunting the motherfucker down, Courfeyrac was an appealing target… and Courefyrac seemed to feel likewise.  “Well _someone_ apparently was!” Grantaire snapped.  “And I swear to god when I figure out who it was…”

“Yeah, well, I’ll be right behind you,” muttered Courfeyrac, and the agreement was enough to lessen the tension between them, at least somewhat.  “…Do you think we should call the others?  They might know something.”

Enjolras didn’t say anything but Grantaire could see his fists tighten around his knees from the corner of his eyes, clearly distressed.

Grantaire shook his head.  “Enjolras didn’t seem to want anyone told.”

“Yeah, but is that a good idea…?”

“Fucked if I know.  I have no idea what I’m doing, Courf, I’m like the worst person ever to be here.  But I don’t think we should tell anyone until Enjolras gives the okay, y’know?”

“Yeah…  Enjolras?”

Still nothing, and the silence grew after that, congealing into something thick and choking, with Enjolras not speaking and Grantaire and Courfeyrac not know what to do now except run in circles and nip at each other’s heels in misdirected anger.  Just as it was getting unbearable though, it was shattered by the shriek of a cellphone, making them all jump, Enjolras raising his head for the first time in minutes. The real world had no place here and the sudden reminder that somewhere beyond this room, this silence, this horror, other people were moving about as if nothing had changed was almost unnerving.

It was Courfeyrac's phone, and he fished it out of his pocket awkwardly, staring at it as dumbly as the rest of them, as if he had somehow forgotten what to do with such a thing over the past few minutes. Grantaire wouldn't blame him if he had, the entire world had been turned on its ear. Or at least his entire understanding of Enjolras had been and sometimes that was as close as he could get. The ringing was piercing though, and Enjolras looked visibly unsettled by it, face ashen and eye wide as he stared at it like he expected it to jump him, so when it became clear that Courfeyrac had no intention of picking it up Grantaire grit his teeth and bit the bullet that none of them wanted to.

Plucking the phone from Courfeyrac's fingers he answered with a curt, “What?”

He felt a little bad, especially when it was a Combeferre's voice that replied rather than Guillaume's like Grantaire had half feared, but he was too tired and stressed and freaked out to do anything about it.

“Grantaire? What are you doing with Courfeyrac's phone?”

“Courf couldn't get it,” said Grantaire with a grimace. Courfeyrac shot him an apologetic look, but he seemed more focussed on Enjolras, whose eyes were still fixed on the phone, waiting for something.

“You mean to tell me he's that engrossed with his studying?  That doesn’t sound like the Courfeyrac I know.”

For a moment Grantaire was confused, until he suddenly remembered that he and Courfeyrac were supposed to be having a study session. Making plans for it, Courfeyrac going out to get snacks... that seemed like eons ago, as if the phone really was part of another world, a thin connection to a place that still made sense – a place where Courf made out with Marius while he was buying chips and Grantaire came to hang out at his apartment to try to forget his fucked up crush on Enjolras by burying his nose in textbooks and movies.

“Yeah,” said Grantaire awkwardly, “it's... been a weird evening.” He was trying to make eye contact with Enjolras, to divine what he should be saying or doing here, but Enjolras' eyes refused to meet his, flittering away uncomfortably, focusing on the phone itself rather than the man holding it.

“You don't say,” said Combeferre. “'Cause a few minutes ago I got a call from Guillaume, who was freaking out over Enjolras having some sort of panic attack because of stress or something and running off, and how he can't find him anywhere now, so now _I'm_ in a panic because my best friend is missing and not answering his phone, and now my other best friend is apparently AWOL and you have his phone? I swear, Grantaire, if you know what's going on...”

“I... One second.” He covered the receiver with one hand but held the phone out towards Enjolras. “It's Combeferre,” he said.

Enjolras balked.

“I... I can't,” said Enjolras, voice rough and desperate. “I can't. I...”

“Enjolras, it's okay,” said Courfeyrac soothingly. “It's fine. If you need me to talk to him, telling him what's going on...”

“No!”

That drew up both Grantaire and Courfeyrac short, as Enjolras temper flared again. Before it gained any traction though it immediately drained away, leaving Enjolras crumpled once more against the couch.

“No,” he repeated, softer but no less forceful, no less desperate. “Please don't... don't tell him. I don't want...”

Grantaire and Courfeyrac exchanged looks.

“But it's... Combeferre,” said Courfeyrac.

“Please,” repeated Enjolras. “Just... just tell him I'm okay. That everything's okay. That everything's...” He cut himself off with a harsh sniff, dragging the back of his hand under his nose. Grantaire found himself looking away, as if seeing Enjolras crying so messily yet again were some sort of blaspheme.

“I'll... see what I can do,” said Courfeyrac, standing up and taking the phone from Grantaire. He shot Grantaire one final, warning look, as if ordering him to be gentle, before he started walking away towards his bedroom with the phone held to his ear, his tone forcing a lightness that it wasn't able to support.

-

The phone and Courfeyrac now gone, the silence returned, deadening and oppressive.

Shifting uneasily in his seat Grantaire sought for something, _anything_ , to say, but he had a hard enough time talking with Enjolras at the best of times; what could he say now, after everything that Enjolras had reluctantly admitted to. What sort of word dare he utter aloud that could be placed next to the jagged, ugly truths that Enjolras had revealed?

“I don't know what to do here,” Grantaire found himself repeating when it felt like he would go mad from the silence.

“And you think I do?” ask Enjolras, whose face was back against his knees.

“Sure,” said Grantaire weakly. “I mean, you're Enjolras. You could guide the planets into new orbits if you liked and they'd think it was a great idea, God himself would probably compliment you on the new design.”

Enjolras' head tweaked upwards, only a touch, no more pronounced than the twitch of lips that may have just been the ghost of a smile, but it gave Grantaire some touch of hope.

“I think astronomical matters are best left to Combeferre,” Enjolras said.

“Astronomical, maybe, but the celestial? That's all you.”

Grantaire had thought, perhaps, he had been making some little headway but was disappointed by the frustrated noise Enjolras made in response. It had been a rather foolish hope that it would be his nattering that helped Enjolras – curse Courfeyrac for running off, it was precisely so that he wouldn't have to be alone with Enjolras that he had wanted the man here in the first place.

“Why do you always do that?” asked Enjolras, angry. “You make me sound like some sort of, of, of _god_. Like I should know exactly what's going on – well did it ever occur to you that I _don't_ , Grantaire? I don't know what's going on and I've, I've, I've messed it all up and I'm a _wreck_.” Enjolras’ voice broke over the last word, and Grantaire’s heart along with it. “I don't know how to fix it, Grantaire. I don't even know what I did or what I want or how... how to make it _stop_.”

“I'm sorry,” said Grantaire, voice small, silently begging for Enjolras not to start crying again. Not knowing what else to do Grantaire slid from his chair and shuffled in front of Enjolras so that he was on his knees before him, as close as he could come without touching, trying to offer whatever comfort Enjolras could possibly find in him without causing him to panic again. “I'm sorry.” He was sorry for so, so much.  More than he even understood.

-


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is going kind of slowly right now (though if you've been following along for this long I suppose you're kind of use to that, sorry). I'm still working on how best to switch gears from the first half to the second half of this story and it's making things really slow. Plus, y'know, summer. I have a lot of family and personal stuff coming up in August, so I can't promise what sort of updates I'll be able to manage in that time since I'm thinking I won't have a lot of free time for writing, but I'll do my best.

“I'm sorry, Ferre,” said Courfeyrac as he lay on his bed, phone pressed hard against his ear and pillow clutched to his chest. “I can't... really talk about it right now. But Enjolras is here and he's... he's...”

“Not okay?” said Combeferre gently.

“Not really,” admitted Courfeyrac. “But he doesn't want me to talk about it right now. Hell, _he_ doesn't want to talk about it and I still don't really know...” He broke off and pressed his free hand over his face, scrubbing at his eyes where he felt them stinging. “I think we fucked up, Ferre,” he whispered.

“What in the world is going on, Courf? Guillaune... he made it sound like it was just... just stress. Like school or exams or something. We all know Enjolras takes too much on himself, it sounded like...”

“It wasn't– He–” Courfeyrac took a deep breath. “Look don't... talk to Guillaume about this. Don't tell him Enj is with us right now, okay? Just... don't. We'll talk more soon, I promise, once Enjolras is... is feeling... better.” Better, oh god, was there a _better_ after something like this? This – finding your soulmate, building a life with them – was supposed to _be_ the better. “It'll be okay,” he said, because he needed it said aloud.

“It will be, whatever _it_ is,” said Combeferre, and Courfeyrac could hear the frustrated curiosity in Combeferre's voice. Courf almost smiled because it was just so... familiar. Combeferre was a terrible person to try to leave out of the loop because he was so desperately curious about everything – and people made Courf out to be the gossip when nothing was as terrible as Combeferre with some unanswered question eating at his mind. But he also knew that if anyone could be trusted to respect Enjolras' boundaries – even if they didn't really know what those boundaries were right now – it was Combeferre.

-

“Tell me what to do,” begged Grantaire.

Enjolras raised his head slightly, and Grantaire was able to stare up into his eyes framed by his wild, damp hair. The eyes were rimmed with red, swollen, with deep shadows under them, but still piercing in a way that took Grantaire's breath away. It wasn’t even beauty, not exactly, not with the desperation in the lines around his mouth or the exposed bruises dirtying his face; this look was like the antithesis to Enjolras' usual optimistic, determined fervor and it was equal parts stunning and horrifying. It made Grantaire's mind flash to the tattered remains of his paper-cut project, to his own soulmate, and that scared him even more, the idea that something deep within Enjolras could be torn beyond repair.

“I will do anything for you,” he said desperately.

Suddenly Enjolras' lip was between his teeth and his head had snapped away, eyes pressed shut as if against a painful memory.

“I don't want that!” he snapped just as suddenly, making Grantaire recoil.

“No, sorry, of course you don't,” said Grantaire, backpedalling frantically – stuipd, _stuipd_ – trying to give Enjolras space once more, both physically and, well, emotionally. _Where_ was Courfeyrac? “Sorry...”

“No, I'm sorry, that's not– that's not what I meant, Grantaire–” And Enjolras was stumbling up, moving towards Grantaire even as Grantaire moved away, one desperate hand reaching out to catch Grantaire's. “Please don't leave,” he said, voice catching in his throat.

“I won't. Not if you want me here,” said Grantaire, accepting the hand clutching his own.

With exaggerated motions he stood properly and carefully moved back to the couch, this time sitting down in the spot next Enjolras instead of kneeling at his feet, ever slow so as not to startle him again. Not letting go of Grantaire's hand, Enjolras too sat down.

“I don't know what's wrong with me,” said Enjolras. “I don't... I don't know what I want.”

“That's okay,” said Grantaire, for lack of anything better. “Hell, I don't know what I want half the time and I don't even have the excuse of... of... this.”

Silence returned briefly after that, as uncomfortable as before but this time with the burning point of heat that was Enjolras' hand in Grantaire's. Grantaire tried desperately hard not to dwell on it while begging Courfeyrac with his mind to return.

“I don't really know much about planets or, or their orbits, or anything,” said Enjolras suddenly.

“Oh. Well that was kinda just... a metaphor? I guess? Or something. I didn't really expect you to, like, be able to give me a lecture on the annual rotation of Jupiter or anything.”

“No, I mean... you could tell me? About planets? Sorry, no, it's stupid, I just thought...”

“No, no, that's fine, I could, if you like? I mean, you said yourself that Combeferre's probably the better candidate for this, but...”

Enjolras was shaking his head though. “No, I don't mean astronomy I mean... celestial?” He seemed to consider this for a moment before adding, “Combeferre says I'm a Leo?”

“Ah, the sun sign, the regal, proud lion, of course you are. Well, if you want a bunch of mythological star bullshit then you came to the right place...”

-

“And Courf,” said Combeferre, “are _you_ okay?”

“Me?” asked Courfeyrac, incredulous. How could anyone be worried about _him_ right now? After everything that had been said tonight, with everything that hadn't been said yet... “I'm fine.”

“Courf.”

“I'm... oh _god_.” Courfeyrac gave an embarrassingly loud sob then, one that he hadn't even realized was building. “This is all so awful, Ferre, I don't know what to do. But I have to do something! Oh god, fuck, shit, I fucked up so badly Ferre, we both did, we all did, how could we not know, not…” He bit his lip, stopping himself, because Enjolras had said no and, well, as much as Courfeyrac might want to he couldn’t make this choice.

“Courf...” said Combeferre, gentle but ignorant. He couldn't comfort Courfeyrac because he didn't know what was going on – for the next few hours, days, however long it took for Enjolras to deign to tell his closest friend and quickest confidant this horrible secret, Combeferre would live in blissful ignorance. “Courf, if you need to come over, my door's open.”

“I don't think I can tonight,” said Courfeyrac. There was no way he could leave Enjolras tonight. “But... thank you. I mean it. And I'm sure Enjolras will tell you soon it's just...”

“Things are complicated.”

“Yeah.”

They didn't stay on the phone much longer after that; there wasn't much more that could be said without Courfeyrac breaking his word to Enjolras. Even if it was Combeferre who magically made all things better. After hanging up though Courfeyrac didn't immediately return to the other room.

For just a moment he allowed himself to fall backwards onto his pillows and stare up at the ceiling. Last night he and Marius had lain in this same bed, stared at this same ceiling, thinking everything was perfect in the world while Enjolras might have been in some other bedroom, in some other house where Courfeyrac couldn't protect him, getting bruised by a man who was supposed to love him. It was like a nightmare, except not really, because the last nightmare Courfeyrac could remember having had involved a t-rex after letting Joly make him marathon all the Jurassic Park movies. This? This was so, so unimaginably worse.

Grantaire had said that Enjolras had told someone about this. What if Enjolras had told _him_ and he hadn’t been listening? What if it had been one of their phone calls when Courfeyrac had been humming along with Enjolras as he talked about ABC projects while being more absorbed in making faces at Marius across the room? Or what if it had been while they were still sharing an apartment and had been when Courfeyrac was falling asleep in front of Netflix? Christ, could it have been going on as long as that?

What if this was all his fault? What if he could have stopped this and hadn’t even known at the time?

Courfeyrac sat up sharply, scrubbing at his face as he did. Enough of this, he had a job to do, he couldn't wallow, not while Enjolras was in the other room, scared and bruised and still not telling them everything. Pocketing his phone, Courfeyrac got up and left his room; from the other room he could hear Grantaire's rumbling voice as he rambled about something – space from the sounds of it, or mythology maybe, he wasn't sure, but it was such a familiar sound that it was almost enough to put Courfeyrac at ease as he went to join them.


	3. Chapter 3

“-and, well, since its fur was impervious to metal and wood and… I can’t remember, something else, basically any weapon, right? Anyways, right, so since he couldn’t fight it with a weapon Heracles was basically like ‘well fuck this’ and decided to just fight the huge ass, invincible lion _with his bare hands_ because, yeah, that makes the most sense right? If the big lion _I_ was going to fight on some godly quest could literally not be hurt by a fucking sword I’d definitely go for the bare knuckle approach next.”

Enjolras let out a huff of air which may almost have been categorized as a laugh. “You kickbox,” he noted.

“And while I appreciate that show of confidence, that doesn’t mean my next step is Giant Lion of Death. Though I do go up against Bahorel so that might actually be worst; he may be impervious to some metals. Oh, Courf, thank god…”

Enjolras looked up from his hands – in which he was fiddling with the scrap of the paper cut, now dried into an awkward wave of torn scales – in time to catch Courfeyrac’s eye as he sidled out of the bedroom. He gave Enjolras an uncertain smile, though it was hard when faced by the livid bruise and swollen eyes. Enjolras’ jaw muscles did something back, but it was hard to say if it was meant to be a return smile, barely concealed panic, or annoyance at Grantaire’s story being interrupted.

“So,” said Courfeyrac, trying to keep his tone light, trying to keep Enjolras from recoiling again, “you talking again, dude?”

He walked around the room – slowly, no suddenly movements – to the chair and dragged it a little closer to the couch, now that Grantaire was in his spot.

Enjolras just shrugged in response. And then, after some sort of internal debate, he added, “I guess. Sorry.”

“You don’t have to be sorry,” said Grantaire immediately and severely.

Again, Enjolras shrugged. “You guys were supposed to be watching movies tonight. Instead now you have to… deal with me.”

Grantaire and Courfeyrac shared a look.

“Okay, but you’re also, arguably, at least a _little_ more important than watching James Bond fuck his way through several decades’ worth of movies,” said Courf.

Enjolras shrugged again, head lowering, giving Courfeyrac the opportunity to mouth in horror at Granatire. What was going on? When had Enjolras ever been so… insecure? He gave his affection to his friends freely and generously, and never thought twice about receiving the same in turn. He demanded dedication and loyalty from his friends and ensured they were happy to give it. It was an unsettling thought that stuck in Courfeyrac’s chest at that realization, that this wasn’t just something awful that _had_ happened, it was something awful that _was happening_. If Enjolras thought they would rather kick him out and watching mediocre, campy spy movies…

“Enjolras,” said Courfeyrac, leaning as close to Enjolras as he could without leaving his chair, “we love you, man. We’d happily never see Sean Connery’s noble face ever again if it meant making sure you’re okay.”

Enjolras gave a muffled sniff at that.

“Can you tell us what happened?” When that still only received stony silence, Courfeyrac tried again: “Can you tell us who you told about it?”

Enjolras raised his head a little at that, mouth narrow and taut as a bow string, brow creased. “You,” he said softly. There was no accusation in his voice.

For Courfeyrac, the world stopped turning and everything crumbled into only that single word.

_You_.

Grantaire was on his feet with an inarticulate noise while Courfeyrac was still trying to make sense of this. No. No. This was what he had been afraid of, but it had been a deep, dark, nagging fear, not one he had truly thought could be true. He would _never_ have let this happen to Enjolras, _never_.

“No…” he said, glancing between Enjolras' pinched face and Grantaire’s, pale with horror and confusion and fury. “No, you couldn’t have. No. Enjolras, I swear, I didn’t know anything about this.” Grantaire’s fists were balled and Enjolras was silent so Courfeyrac turned to the former. “You think I'd be _okay_ with this? I didn't know, he didn't say anything! If I had, god if only I had...”

“I did!” Enjolras cried. “You did! I...” His face was lined with confusion though and he was tapering off, staring at some middle distance as if trying to make sense of his thoughts. “I... I did,” he said, fire fading. “I did. I asked... you and Combeferre. I talked to you both. I didn't know what to do and you said... you helped me. You told me I wasn't trying hard enough.” By the end it sounded like he was almost trying to convince himself, like he wasn't sure.

Enjolras might look less and less certain about his own memories, but understanding was slowly dawning on Courfeyrac.

“What, that you weren't trying hard enough to be a good punching bag–” snarled Grantaire.

“Grantaire,” said Courfeyrac warningly again, but his expression, meanwhile, had become more and more distant. Horror was creeping in on the coattails of realization.

Grantaire settled into an irate silence but his gaze was locked on both men, anger simmering close to the surface.

“Enjolras,” said Courfeyrac slowly, “can you... can you tell me what you mean?”

Enjolras was pulling his arms closer to his body. “Can we stop talking about this? I'm sorry I said anything, I should have just stayed, I don't...”

“That is not what you’re taking out of this, you should _not_ have stayed, holy fucking shit” said Grantaire as Courfeyrac said, “Please, Enjolras, humour me. When did you tell me about this?”

His face twisted agonizingly; Enjolras looked like he’d rather be anywhere than there. “…During our movie night. I asked you about... and you said...”

Courfeyrac jerked back, stumbling up off the chair, hand pressed against his mouth and eyes wide. It was exactly what Courfeyrac had been afraid of but hearing it out loud, confirmed…

“But you asked me about... please... please tell me I'm wrong, Enjolras, please.” No, he couldn’t accept _that_ , it couldn’t be true, couldn’t be right because that meant… that meant the absolute worse. And it meant that he was at fault.

“What?” demanded Grantaire, when it was clear that Enjolras wasn't about to say anything more.

Courfeyrac just shook his head but tears were beginning to fall from his eyes. The rain seemed very loud.

“But he's your... He couldn't... You're soulmates!” said Courfeyrac, but it sounded like he was begging.

“He didn't,” whispered Enjolras. “I just... I couldn't do it right. He... he...”

Enjolras gave a choking sob which made Courfeyrac crumple back into the chair, hands fluttering out to reach for Enjolras, to hold him, but holding back, hovering above his trembling body, not daring to touch.

“I can't do it,” sobbed Enjolras. “I want it to stop, Courfeyrac, please, I tried...”

“Courfeyrac!” demanded Grantaire.

“I didn’t know,” whispered Courfeyrac hoarsely, though he wasn’t sure if it was to Grantaire, or Enjolras, or himself. It didn’t possibly seem like it could be a good enough justification for any of them. “I thought… I thought you were just having bad… I thought you just wanted advice. I didn’t know he was… I’m sorry. Oh god, I’m so sorry Enjolras, I’m sorry.”

Somehow, Grantaire resisted asking again, but his agitation was obvious from his tense shoulders and the piercing stare he was shooting Courfeyrac.

“I think… I think Guillaume,” said Courfeyrac, feeling disconnected, somehow distant from his body and voice, entirely consumed by this wretched reality he had found himself in. “Guillaume r– He. I think he rr– he forced…”

“No,” whispered Enjolras, voice tight, body trembling with tension, “he didn't, he didn't...” He was lying though, it was obvious. It was always obvious when Enjolras lied. Except lately, apparently, when it truly mattered.

“What–?”

Courfeyrac saw Grantaire’s gaze jump from Courfeyrac’s face, which must be showing as much horror as he was feeling, to Enjolras' twisted expression, eyes red from crying, his bruise, down to his hands, which were now clenched so tightly around the scales, Medusa’s scales, at they were probably at risk of being torn again… The realization that struck across Grantaire’s face was horrible to witness, it and the small, helpless noise that followed.

“Rape,” said Grantaire, distantly. “He… he…? He couldn’t, how could he–? He raped you.”

Courfeyrac just wanted to press his hands over his ears and make all of this go away when Enjolras started crying again.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> general apology for general things - taking forever to post, not answering asks (i read them all and love them all i'm so sorry i haven't responded to any of them in ages), short chapter... the usual.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HERE WE GO AGAIN I GUESS, WOW
> 
> This is for anyone left that actually cares about what happens to this fic.
> 
> It's been two long years, and more hiatuses before that than I care to admit, but I -will- be finishing this fic. I meant to let it die a well-deserved death, but somehow over the past two years I've consistently had people pop up from time to time, asking about an ending.  So to one anon on tumblr I promised that this summer I'd finish it, one way or another.  And now, as of this minute, it is all officially written.  I'll upload it over the next few days.
> 
> A warning: it won't be all that polished.
> 
> I tried, but honestly I can't edit it all that well, just because... well... 90% of it was over two years old.  My writing has changed and grown and honestly if I look at this too long I'll probably burn it rather than post it.
> 
> So this is purely meant for the poor bastards who read about Enjolras being tortured and then had to go two years with no conclusion - it is only meant to be closure, not a shining example of my abilities or anything.
> 
> ANOTHER IMPORTANT WARNING RE: TRIGGERS  
> Before I had specific content warnings before chapters -- that won't exist from this point on. I'm not rereading every individual section again before posting (I can't stand it, seriously) so that means I won't remember every thing that happens in each bit.   
> This work will deal with trauma from an abusive relationship and past rape, and will include references to said rape as well as possibly graphic flashbacks. Also victim blaming and panic attacks and fun stuff like that. If this sounds upsetting to you, I advice you not to read further (though nothing should be as graphic as the stuff that went down in Part One). Be safe, do what's best for you!
> 
> So, for those asking for it... enjoy, I guess.

What could you do after hearing something like that? A part of Grantaire had always liked to think that in some weird, awful circumstance – the sort of terrible shit you see in gritty movies or artsy books – he would be able to handle things better than the bumbling protagonists. They always seemed to make ridiculous, grandiose speeches that made _Grantaire_ want to punch them, never mind how the victim was feeling, or they did nothing but shove their foot in their mouth and just make everything a million times worse until it got better – if it got better, you never knew with that artsy stuff. But now Grantaire would give anything to have the wits of one of those characters.

The silence that followed the realization was awful, filled with nothing but the sound of rain, and Enjolras crying, and, almost worst of all, the distant sounds of people in other apartments, as if they had any right to continue living their lives while something as monumental and terrible as this was happening. Grantaire had wanted to say something, _anything_ , that could even _attempt_ to make things better but, well... what _could_ you do after hearing something like that? What could you say? That he'd kill Guillaume? Tempting, but probably not what Enjolras needed to hear right now. That this would make Enjolras stronger as a person? Please, he'd have to kick his own ass then, only some half-wit action hero dared say something like that. That at least it was over? Well... was it? This wasn't a movie, Guillaume was still out there, and Grantaire had no idea what the next step was.

So Grantaire said nothing, and neither did Courfeyrac (who may very well have been crying himself, Grantaire couldn't tell, could barely make out anything over Enjolras' tears and the echoing of the horror that seemed to have hollowed him out). When they did start speaking, no one said the r-word again and the issue was neatly hedged around.

Enjolras would move back into his room here in Courfeyrac's apartment.

They would tell Guillaume that Enjolras had gotten a call from home and had had to leave right away, there had been an emergency. Courfeyrac would be the one to actually contact Guillaume. It seemed unlikely that he would believe this, but if they were lucky he'd at least believe that Enjolras had gone home – in either case, it wouldn't be easy for him to contest it, not without alerting the rest of their friends that something was off.

The important thing was that no one would be told about this.

Grantaire had almost wanted to argue that, but that wasn't his place. None of this was his place. And as much as Grantaire never wanted to let Enjolras leave his sight ever again, he was embarrassingly grateful when Enjolras stood and said he was going to bed, making it clear that this conversation was over, and Grantaire was able to escape back to his own apartment and away from all of _this_.

Maybe if he was lucky this would all turn out to have been a bad dream and he'd wake up to find Enjolras just as disgustingly in love with his soulmate as he had been a few hours ago. What a world it was that Grantaire was now _wishing_ for that.

-

That first day slowly but surely turned into days. In an abstract way, Enjolras would have never believed it possible. It had felt so surely like the world was ending, but he supposed it was rather self-absorbed to assume that it was anything more than his world that had stopped functioning. Days turned into a week. And then the week passed. And Enjolras hadn't moved.

Well, technically he had _moved_ , which meant he was arguably doing better than some of his worst days with Guillaume where he had just curled up in bed and resisted anything that might compel him to leave. But this movement had been strictly limited to washroom visits and food excursions, though even that wasn't wholly necessary – he had forgotten how nice it was to have someone that just... did things for you. Courfeyrac often appeared in his doorway, filled with soft words and a plate of food that Enjolras would nobly try to pick at even though his appetite was fickle at best.

That wasn't really fair though, was it? Guillaume often did things like that; he was generous. He would bring Enjolras food while he was up late studying, and be waiting up for him by the door if he came home late, and gave him back rubs when the tension in his neck was almost unbearable. Why was it so easy to forget all the good, wonderful things about his soulmate and just focus on the... on the...

On the _not_. On the absence.

His world seemed to be very full of these negative space lately.

All he knew though was that when his phone chimed and he saw that a friend had texted him, asking how he was, if he was having a good time at his parents, or (either because they were perceptive or because Grantaire or Courfeyrac had let something slip, Enjolras couldn't be sure) if he was doing okay, he just felt this crushing exhaustion. Answering them would be like acknowledging the rest of the world, the unblemished, gently spinning world that had left him behind at some point. It would be acknowledging yesterday when he had done nothing but stare at his bedroom wall for hours, or just over a week ago when he had broken down in front of Courfeyrac and Grantaire, or a month ago when he had been _pressed against a bed and_ –

Or it would be acknowledging _tomorrow_ and the endless stream of tomorrows he was somehow going to have to deal with. And that was terrifying. So Enjolras didn't.

When his phone chimed and he saw that it was Guillaume though, it was a primal, animalistic fear that shot through him. On Day Two, when the first text from Guillaume had come, everything that had happened, that could happen, that would happen (and it would, who was he fooling, this reprieve would end, had to end) had hit him all at once. He had been blinded, couldn't breathe, was so consumed by the smells and sounds and pains that he hadn't even realized he'd left his bed for the first time since collapsing in it the night before until he’d become aware of kitchen linoleum pressing into his knees and Courfeyrac in front of him, holding him, as he talked him down from the panic attack.

Grantaire was the one who had called it a panic attack, when he had come over later for supper and Courfeyrac had told Grantaire what had happened. Enjolras and Courfeyrac had had a raging fight over whether or not Grantaire would be told an hour before, when Enjolras had shrieked and howled at Courfeyrac, the sickening fear in his gut twisting him, driving him to act and react with little thought in between, like an animal mad with fear. ( _Animals don't have soulmates – soulmates show the depth of the human experience, that it requires two people tied together to experience it fully_.) Courfeyac had won, only because after Enjolras had finally worn himself hoarse (not hard, his throat had already been taxed from the crying last night) he had looked him in the eye and told him “Enjolras, I won't tell anyone else about... about what happened. Because you don't want me to and that's your choice and I won't take that from you. But you couldn't _breathe_ , you were nearly passed out in the kitchen, _sobbing_ , and, fuck, Enjolras, I need help. I don't want you... I can't watch you get hurt, man, I need _someone_.” So, reluctantly, Enjolras had agreed and sat in embarrassed, stony silence while Grantaire had been told.

Admittedly it hadn't had the worst possible outcome.

After supper Courfeyrac had gone to the kitchen to clear the dishes, and Grantaire had joined Enjolras in the living room.

Enjolras had felt vaguely guilty for how much time he was demanding from Grantaire and from Courfeyrac, and it was a feeling that would only continue in that slow progression of days to weeks, with Courfeyrac making sure he spent plenty of time in the apartment with Enjolras, and Grantaire coming over more days than he didn’t. It wasn't fair to them, their worlds hadn't ended, why should they be stuck in the destructive orbit of his? But he was too grateful to turn them away, even if they often did nothing more than sit in silence. It was the greatest gift he could ask for, to not being alone free to imagine Guillaume appearing in every doorway or window (or worse, feeling the gnawing guilt of leaving and thinking that maybe it might just get bad enough that he would go back on his own accord).

So that evening he’d done nothing but appreciatively soak in Grantaire's presence, until Grantaire had broken the silence.

(Unusual for him, he seemed to mostly talk if Enjolras initiated, the rest of the time he sat there, looking almost as uncomfortable as Enjolras. It was unlike the Grantaire Enjolras knew. He was used to Grantaire being loud and abrasive and demanding, the sort of person to interupt meetings and heckle their discussions, for the pure joy of the attention. The thought that it was Enjolras' fault that Grantaire had become silence... it just confirmed his fear, that there was something inherently toxic about being near him. But it was like Guillaume had said, he was selfish, and he couldn't stand to send Grantaire away.)

“Do you... do you know anything about panic attacks?” Grantaire had asked, uncertainly.

Enjolras had given his head a shake. Only that they felt like dying, apparently. Maybe it hadn't been a panic attack at all – he had wondered at one point if you could die piece by piece and maybe that was what was happening. He had, or was at least trying to, cut his soulmate loose, and was that really any different from cutting your heart out?

“Right,” Grantaire had said. “Um, so, at least the way Courf described it, that pretty much sounds like that's what was going on. So, um, the trick is to just, y'know, breathe.”

“You don't say,” Enjolras had muttered before he could catch himself. Grantaire's mouth had raised at the corners though, so perhaps that was okay.

“Fair point. Okay, so it basically feels like the worse thing in the world, right? Like you're going to die?” When Enjolras had nodded, Grantaire had continued with, “Well, you're not. You're not dying, even if it fucking feels like you are and maybe it fucking feels like that wouldn't even be a bad thing if it just made it all stop. But you gotta fight it. I dunno that's at least how it was– that is, that's how I've heard it described. And you're pretty fucking fantastic at fighting, so that probably works for you.”

“Not that fantastic, apparently,” Enjolras had said. Maybe it was spending the past few days barely speaking at all, or months keeping quiet about something that took up his whole world, but here, now, with only Grantaire in the room, is had become startlingly easy to speak his mind.

Grantaire had frowned at him though. “What sort of Enjolras is this? Be careful, Apollo, you're beginning to sound like me. You're the best fighter I've ever seen and I study the Greeks. You'd tear the world down around you if you thought you needed to. So shit happened and... and yeah, it was big shit, don't get me wrong, but you're still a fighter. You still told us, right? And that was obviously scary as fuck so don't give me any of this 'not a fighter' bullshit, you're as badass as it comes, Apollo. And if you think you can kick the government's ass you can definitely kick your brain's ass.”

Grantaire had stopped for a moment, to try to gather his thoughts. “I think I got off track with that pep talk. Wow, I suck at pep talks, please don't make me do any more. Right, so, kicking your brain's ass...”

Grantaire's voice continued, deep and rumbling, and even though he was being serious it still had the rolling cadence that Enjolras had grown so accustom to, so _fond_ of. Even if Enjolras didn't know if he would be able to remember the advice Grantaire was offering if something like earlier ever happened again, it was still just soothing to hear. A soothing voice, a soothing thought to think that a friend was sitting next to him, trying to help him keep from being hurt.

“Where did you learn that?” Enjolras had asked after Grantaire had finally trailed off.

Grantaire's eyes had flickered sharply away from him and he’d given another sharp shrug. “Oh, you know. Around. You pick stuff up.”

With nothing to add to that, and most of his energy just directed to trying to commit what Grantaire had said to memory, Enjolras had let the conversation die until Courfeyrac came back and he and Grantaire had started talking about some sitcom for a bit. It’d been clear they were leaving gaps for him to join in – he’d even recognized the show – but he hadn’t been able bring himself to talk about something with a laugh track that evening, so he hadn’t.

He had still been grateful for their talking though.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final reminder that I'm not necessarily rereading/editing these chapters before posting, so there will not be any specific content warnings on the upcoming chapters. Be aware that any of them may include aspects of an abusive relationship, abuse recovery, and references or flashbacks to rape, in line with how the rest of this story has been written so far.

Enjolras wasn't getting better.

At first it had been easier to justify not telling anyone else about what had happened. In some way Grantaire had been able to convince himself that by not telling them it was giving Enjolras the necessary room to heal, that having everyone know would just prolong things, and that keeping it quiet would let it all just... fade away, so thing could go back to normal.

Put like that it felt disgustingly selfish.

Especially since Enjolras, as far as he could tell, _wasn't_ healing. It had been two weeks now and he wasn't really doing much of anything. According to Courfeyrac he barely left his room, and if he did he never went further than the rest of the apartment. He wasn't eating much, and he had had at least a few panic attacks (that they knew of, at least – if he had had others, when he'd been alone in the apartment, it was totally possible that he wouldn't tell them). He still hadn't responded to any text messages he'd received, and had missed every Amis meeting since that night.

Unsurprisingly their friends were getting worried. Of course they thought he was with his family, but such an impromptu visit, during the school year, and with him not responding to any texts meant that people were getting concerned. Guillaume had been looking sullen, but he couldn't actually say with certainty that either Grantaire or Courfeyrac or anyone else for that matter knew where Enjolras was. Guillaume tried to put on a confident façade when others asked him about Enjolras – because what sort of soulmate didn't know where their other half was? – but it was obvious to Grantaire that he was getting increasingly angry.

It was getting easier and easier to see what Enjolras might have been forced to experience, the creature that lived under Guillaume's good nature and smiles and earnest interest in social work. Also, it was getting harder and harder not to punch him in the face.

So while there was a sort of petty pleasure in keeping Guillaume in the dark it was more difficult to do so to their friends. Not just because they could be stubborn, nosy assholes, but because it was hard to lie to them. Which was odd, because Grantaire normally had no problem with hedging around the truth when it came to his own issues, but for some reason it was harder when he was holding Enjolras' issues, Enjolras' _well-being_ , in his hands. He was going to mess something up, he just knew it, if he hadn't already.

(And maybe he had: he hadn't noticed anything before Enjolras had been forced to seek out help himself, had he? Hadn't acted on any of his misgivings, had disregarded his feelings about Guillaume, had discredited it all. If only he'd said something, anything...)

But even though everything seemed to be growing into something increasingly awful and twisted and impossible, he and Courf finally met on campus one day to talk. It felt... wrong to talk about Enjolras like this when he wasn't here but they were the only two involved. They needed to get him to do something, they decided. Grantaire might not understand what Enjolras was going through but he did understand inertia and how hard it could be to break the cycle once you fell into it. So that was why tonight, after they were done eating another silent meal where Enjolras just picked at some salad, they cornered him in the living room.

Enjolras was already curled up on the couch, a book open half-heartedly in his lap; Grantaire shot Courfeyrac an encouraging look and with that Courfeyrac swooped in. Admittedly, it was the most casual, non-threatening swoop Grantaire had ever seen, with Courf wandering into the room, folding up a coat that had been left on the couch that had been left on the couch so that he had space to sit, before turning to face Enjolras, with a whole couch cushions berth between them.

“We think you need to get out of the house,” said Courfeyrac, because Grantaire had refused to be the one to do it.

That had about the expected response – Enjolras jerked back with a look of betrayal, and beneath that, terror. It wasn't an easy look to meet in the eye.

“If you would to just come to a meetings,” Courf pressed. “Let everyone know you're okay. Do _something_. This... can't be healthy, Enjolras.”

The next look Enjolras shot their way was an easy one to read: _Guillaume would be there._ Which was probably true.

“You should tell everyone what's going on,” suggested Grantaire, flinching back pre-emptively from the look Enjolras turned on him.

“Don’t you dare–” Enjolras started, but Grantaire held up defensive palms and Enjolras trickled off, though his warning glare remained.

“I wouldn't,” promised Grantaire. “But... I still think you should. Look, everyone still thinks Guillaume is a great guy, he's still coming to meetings, still hanging out, and unless the others know what the fuck he is we can't really change that. Believe me, if I could say 'hey he's a fucking bag of dicks' and punch him in the face to make him go away I would, but the others still think he's their _friend_.” Grantaire spat the word.

“It wouldn't make any difference,” insisted Enjolras.

“Are you serious? Of course it would! We could kick him out of the fucking group, drop him like the piece of dog shit he is...”

“If they even believe me–”

“Oh, right,” said Grantaire, “because you're totally the sort of person to make up malicious, unbelievable lies about your soulmate–”

“–and we can't just kick him out, we're supposed to be open to anyone–”

“Not _rapists_.”

Everything froze. Enjolras tensed immediately, his gaze going wide and blank; Courfeyrac was sitting straight as a nail, leg bouncing anxiously. It was the first time the word had been used since that night but Grantaire refused to regret it.

“It wasn't– it wasn't _like_ that though,” said Enjolras. His expression was an agonized one, a conflicted one.

“You said it was. Guillaume forced you to have sex. That's fucking rape, Enjolras.”

“It wasn't that simple...”

“It sounds that fucking simple.”

“No one will believe that, Grantaire– _will you stop_. Just stop.”

Grantaire pulled up short, though it was a challenge to hold his tongue. Courfeyrac moved up in his place, coming to sit next to Enjolras and place a tentative arm around his hunched shoulders.

“Just stop,” Enjolras whispered to his lap, though he folded gently against Courfeyrac's side.

“It's your choice,” said Courfeyrac. “You don't have to tell anyone. ...But you do need to do something, you can't just stay here forever.”

“...You're kicking me out...?”

Just then, there was a sharp knock the door that made Enjolras jump like he'd been shocked, eyes immediately swivelling, undoubtedly expected Guillaume to be the one behind the knock, separated from him by only a thin layer of wood. Courfeyrac shot the door a look but ultimately ignored it, pulling Enjolras closer to him.

“God, no! No. Fuck, no, this is your home, Enjolras, no bargains, no small print. Let's be honest, if you wanted to live under the floorboards and never come out again, we'd probably figure something out. I just... I want you to be okay, Enjolras. And this isn't.”

Enjolras was just starting to ease slightly against Courfeyrac's side when another knock came and he became just as rigid. A tremor ran up his arms that made Grantaire want to grab him and hold him until it stilled.

“Okay, just... just give me a second. Let me deal with whoever this is...” said Courfeyrac, standing up, slowly disentangling Enjolras from him.

“Please...” said Enjolras, but nothing else came, the plea confused and all-encompassing.

“If it's Guillaume he's not coming in here,” Courfeyrac promised solemnly.

“Need me?” asked Grantaire as Courfeyrac marched towards the door.

Courfeyrac just shook his head, gesturing for Grantaire to stay with Enjolras. Behind him, Courfeyrac shut the living room door, blocking off its view of the entryway and the view of anyone at the door might have of them.

Still trembling, Enjolras folded himself against the edge of the couch furthest from the door, body growing limp, eyes closed, as if he'd used every bit of energy he had. Enjolras had for so long seemed like some sort of star, something bright and stunning that ran off a never-ending supply of internal power. To see that energy flicker and fade seemed almost as impossible and horrifying as watching a star die.

They could hear the door open and Courfeyrac's voice raise in speech, but nothing distinct.

Maybe it was that need to fill silence, to turn tension into productivity, to meet fear and overcome it that had been so quintessentially _Enjolras_ , or maybe it was just resignation, but as they waited nervously Enjolras spoke again, softly, so as not to be heard by whoever was at the door. “Okay. I'll go to school on Monday. I'll respond to my text messages and email my profs and sort... sort things out. But then I'm coming home,” he added desperately. _Not going to any meetings, not seeing Guillaume_ , was left unsaid.

“That's–! Dude, that'd be... y'know, that's awesome,” said Grantaire. “If you like, I can skip class and come with you on Monday...”

“No! I don't... You've done– I can walk around campus on my own. I'll be fine. I'll be _fine_. Just...”

“What?”

“I left my school bag, _everything_ , at Guillaume's. Even if I went it'd be pointless. Unless I went back over and...”

“No,” said Grantaire firmly. “Me and Courf can figure out a way to get it, don't worry. You do not have to go back over there, Enjolras.”

“Wait,” came Courf's voice, rising suddenly from its low murmur, “no, I doubt it's...” Footsteps, a pair of them, punctuated Courfeyrac's plea, were walking right towards the closed living room door.

Enjolras was on his feet in an instance; Grantaire wasn't a breath behind him his fists already balled and shoulders tight.

“What? No, I'm pretty sure I left it in here. Do you have someone over, I hear someone...” But it wasn't Guillaume's voice that spoke.

The door opened to reveal Marius Pontmercy, followed by a flustered looking Courfeyrac.

“Oh,” said Marius, staring at Enjolras in shock. “I... didn't know you were home from your parents already?”

“I–” said Enjolras.

“He left his coat over here,” explained Courfeyrac weakly, pointing to the ridiculous, black overcoat that Marius favoured – the one that Courfeyrac had, in fact, tossed onto the ground just minutes ago.

“I see,” said Enjolras, miserably. “Hello.”

-

“So I hear you're breaking into Guillaume's apartment?”

Grantaire could see Courfeyrac's mouth move in a silent curse as Bahorel appeared behind them, draping himself over the back of Courfeyrac's chair.

“You may be getting us confused for James Bond,” said Grantaire, at the same time Courfeyrac asked, “Where did you hear that?”

Bahorel shrugged, and spun himself into an open chair at the café table. “Who would I be to reveal my sources?”

“It was Marius wasn't it?” Courfeyrac groaned.

“I swear to god, can't you muzzle your fucking soulmate?” Grantaire demanded, though the moment it was out of his mouth the humour fell flat, replaced by a sense of unease that was clearly shared equally with Courfeyrac. In light of recent events, it wasn't such a funny joke as it had sounded in Grantaire's head.

“What's up with you two?” Bahorel asked, clearly sensing the tension but not understanding its cause. “And yeah, it was Pontmercy. Me and Feuilly were talking about Enjolras and the poor kid just got more and more fidgety until he sang like a canary. So he's hiding out at your place? What the heck?”

“Who else knows this?” Grantaire asked instead.

Again, Bahorel shrugged. “Dunno, depends. Me and Feuilly at least, and Musichetta was barista-ing at the time, so possibly her. Which would mean Joly and Bossuet as well. And I mentioned it to Combeferre because I figured he might know what the fuck was going on – he doesn't but he's worried sick, just fyi. I haven't told anyone else, but Feuilly might have? Or, you know, Pontmercy. Does Guillaume know about this?”

“ _No_ ,” both Grantaire and Courfeyrac said, with enough force to make Bahorel pause.

“What's going on?” he asked again.

“It's complicated.”

“So's law school but they haven't kicked me out yet. Somehow.”

“Look, long story short,” cut in Grantaire because they needed damage control on a situation that was becoming increasingly impossible to control, “Enjolras is staying with Courf again, Guillaume doesn't know, it needs to stay that way for now – don't ask, and don't mention this to anyone else, _please_ – and me and Courf are going to going to go over to Guillaume's and get some of his stuff back.”

“It's not going to be as dramatic as Marius made it sound,” promised Courf. “We'll be knocking on the door, not knocking it down.”

“I did suggest the latter,” Grantaire muttered.

“Did they have a fight?” asked Bahorel.

“Can you drop it?” asked Grantaire testily.

“Can I come with you?” returned Bahorel.

Courfeyrac and Grantaire exchanged looks.

“'Kay, so something happened, right? And you're not going to tell me, but you are going to go harass someone I rather like to think of as a friend. Let me come with as an unbiased witness or whatever.”

“More like a nosy shit,” muttered Grantaire.

Bahorel shrugged but didn't deny it.

“Why not,” said Courfeyrac. “We might need his help carrying stuff. But seriously, don't tell anyone.”

Grantaire had to bite his tongue to resist suggesting that _punching Guillaume_ was another noble thing they could have Bahorel help them with. Bahorel was good at punching. Grantaire would know, they frequently went and recreationally punched each other. A non-recreational punching of Guillaume seemed like a great idea.

“Fine,” he said instead. “We're going tonight; we've got to do this before Monday.”

“How _Mission Impossible_ ,” said Bahorel. “Cool. I'll meet you at Courf's place. I'll bring the balaclavas.”

 


	6. Chapter 6

Bahorel did in fact bring balaclavas. Only one was black, the other was a riot of colourful, clearly hand-knit yarn, and the third was done up to look like a dinosaur.

“Okay, so we're embracing the moody action hero angst too then, are we?” Bahorel said when he was met with nothing but blank stares from Courfeyrac and Grantaire. “Fine. I brought my truck and have some boxes from work in the back in case we need to haul shit. We're actually doing this then?”

“Yup,” said Courfeyrac, following Bahorel down to his truck and climbing into the backseat so Grantaire could take the passenger seat.

They were almost there when Bahorel spoke again, after keeping half an eye on both Grantaire and Courfeyrac through his rearview mirror, both of whom were clearly brooding over whatever this was exactly.

“So,” he said, “I'm guessing this is more than some ordinary soap opera drama? Since you two look out for blood.”

“Don't worry about it,” said Courfeyrac.

“You do remember that Enjolras is my friend too? And he's dropped off the grid for the past two weeks? Is he alright?”

“No,” said Grantaire darkly.

Bahorel looked fully away from the road to consider Grantaire. The man could be melodramatic at the best of times but he was usually not an overly aggressive person. Right now he looked like he wanted to tear someone to piece with his bare hands. For the time being, Bahorel let it drop, but he was looking forward to seeing what Guillaume had to say for himself.

-

“Hey Courfeyrac, Bahorel, Grantaire,” was what Guillaume said after Courf had buzzed for him at the apartment building and he'd come down to greet them. “What's up? I didn't know you were coming over.”

His tone was jovial enough but he also had a steely look in his eyes that Bahorel didn't like. Then again he and Grantaire had a testy relationship at best and Grantaire wasn't even putting in a nominal effort to not be an ass right now, so there was that.

“Must have forgotten to call,” said Courfeyrac.

Guillaume leaned in the doorway. He was still smiling, but he also wasn't inviting them up to his (and technically Enjolras') apartment. Bahorel was really getting sick of this bullshit. He was wishing he had put on one of the balaclava now, if everyone else was going to be acting like an asshole.

“So,” said Guillaume, “how can I help you guys then?”

Bahorel watched Courf's jaw muscles twitch for a moment before they settled and Courf just gave a smile that was a little more tooth than strictly necessary. “Just popped by to pick up some of Enj's stuff,” Courf said. “Mind if we come up?”

“Why would I let you up to steal my soulmate's stuff while he's at his parents?” asked Guillaume, crossing his arms over his chest.

Bahorel narrowed his eyes. Wrong fucking response. What was going on?

“Uh, because I'm his best friend and he asked me to pick some of his shit up?” said Courfeyrac, with way too much “fight me” in his voice for someone as tiny as Courfeyrac was.

Guillaume glanced from Courfeyrac, to Grantaire and Bahorel. His pleasant façade had fallen and it had left something angry and ugly in its place.

“I know you're keeping him locked up at your place,” Guillaume snapped.

He didn't, Bahorel concluded from the look on Guillaume's face when he said that. At least not with certainty. But he would now; Courfeyrac had a pretty awful poker face. Indeed, the words were no sooner out of Guillaume's mouth than Courfeyrac had rounded his shoulders, glaring fit to kill, while Grantaire took an aggressive step forward.

“He's my fucking soulmate, what do you think you're playing at?” Guillaume snarled. His gaze snapped over to Grantaire, eyes mean. “What sort of fucked up shit do you think you're doing?”

Bahorel watched Grantaire shift uncomfortably but he didn't step down.

“Hey man, what's going on?” said Bahorel amiably, stepping forward, testing the waters. “So Enj is chilling at Courf's, so what? They've been roommates since forever. We just need to pick up some stuff, so what?”

“Besides, you don't _own_ Enjolras, no matter what some bullshit mark says,” Grantaire snapped.

“You wish that, don't you, you sick fuck?” snarled Guillaume, taking a hard step towards Grantaire.

Grantaire's face was red, but his face was so twisted in a snarl Bahorel could almost think it was from anger rather than embarrassment. He stepped in before it go any further though, pushing a hard hand on Grantaire's chest to keep him from jumping Enjolras' soulmate, while he levelled a hard look at Guillaume.

“We just came to get his stuff. You don't own it, so how about you let us go on up and any shit you have to work out with your soulmate you can do on your own time?”

“Are you trying to intimidate me?” he demanded at Courfeyrac after meeting the eyes of the two very large, very muscled men before him. “You can't fucking touch me; I don't owe you shit. And I don't have to let you into my house or give you a damn thing.”

Okay, Bahorel had originally intended to come to try to figure out what was going on and to make sure a couple of his friends didn't try to kick the shit out of another friend. Now though, he was wondering if he shouldn't be the one to kick Guillaume's ass. He was not liking the way they were talking about Enjolras, and this evasiveness was fucking bullshit.

“Don't you?” he said instead of punching the face in front of him. “That's not your stuff, it's your soulmate's – _rightful allocation of personal possessions_ ,” he said, letting it carry in his voice that he was quoting directly from his lawbooks. “What you're doing is illegally withholding personal possessions without any cause for lien.”

Guillaume stared at Bahorel. “I'm _his fucking soulmate..._ ”

“Yeah?” snapped Bahorel. “You got a contract drawn up showing conflation of assets that I haven't heard about? That's Enjolras' shit and you fucking better release it, or else me and Lesgle can go chat up some of our professional school associates who might like an opportunity to advise Enjolras on how to proceed about stolen possessions.” And even though Bahorel had no idea what was going on he crossed his arms over his chest and gave Guillaume the most self-assured, knowing look he could manage and added: “...As well as _anything else_ that Enjolras might want to be advised on.”

That worked. Guillaume baulked and seemed to back-pedal.

“Look, I'm just worried about him,” Guillaume insisted, voice all sweetness, expression all heartfelt concern. “He's not answering my texts, I just want to make sure he's okay. Last I heard he disappeared to his parents and now this...”

“Worry about that after we get his stuff,” said Courfeyrac, pushing past Guillaume then. And Guillaume let them, following them up the stairs, cowed.

Bahorel didn't know what he expected to see when he entered the apartment. Something sinister, something that would explain why everyone had lost their fucking minds all of a sudden, but there was nothing. It was the same apartment Bahorel had visited plenty of times before this. Pretty neat, considering two university students lived in it most of the time (though not anymore it would seem, for some reason) with sunlight streaming in the windows and the smell of breakfast still lingering in the kitchen. It was all very calm, really. He could see Enjolras' laptop sitting on a shelf by the couch, completely unharmed. No signs of anything nefarious having happened here, no reason for Enjolras to have apparently gone to hide out at Courfeyrac's for two weeks now.

It didn't take long for them to gather Enjolras stuff, though it involved a bit of digging around and Guillaume wasn't raising a finger to help. Enjolras was all over this apartment – it had been his home for, what, nearly two months? Why shouldn't it be. Between them they filled a cardboard box of school-related stuff (and how had Enjolras gone two weeks without his school stuff? Sure Bahorel had heard that he hadn't been attending his classes, but for Enjolras to just stop working on his essays and projects or readings for _two weeks_?) including his laptop, charger, mouse, and headphones. Courfeyrac pulled out books that he suspected were Enjolras', though it was hard to say how many were being left behind and how many of the wrong ones they were grabbing – the two had ridiculously similar taste in literature, which had lead to more than one evening of listening to them argue French philosophers like the giant nerds they were. More boxes were filled with clothes, and those were easier to parse out: Guillaume was a much larger man than Enjolras. Grantaire remembered to raid the bathroom for Enjolras' toothbrush and razor and shampoo.

Bahorel was in the kitchen, getting some of the flatwear that he knew was Enjolras' (boring as heck – white plates with a thin blue band around it, nowhere near as cool as the mismatched chaos Bahorel had been collecting from thrift stores) when he accidentally knocked his hand against a bowl that had been sitting on the edge of the cabinet. It fell and shattered, making Bahorel swear and jump away from the broken ceramics.

“Fuck, are you going to destroy my house in the process?” demanded Guillaume, striding into the kitchen.

“Sorry,” said Bahorel rather sheepishly. He hadn't meant to do that. If he'd meant to start breaking shit he'd have thrown it at the wall. You get a much more satisfying crack from that.

Guillaume grunted, eyes flickering out of the kitchen – he probably wanted to keep an eye on Courfeyrac and Grantaire in the bedroom more than Bahorel, since they were currently the pair that was more liable to _intentionally_ break something.

“Whatever,” he finally snapped as he started to leave the kitchen. “Just throw it away.”

Bahorel bent to pick up the bits of the bowl when he realized it had the blue band of one of Enjolras' pieces. For some reason that just made him scowl harder at the shards. He carefully picked them up though and went to dump them in the garbage under the sink when something made him pause. Something in the garbage. Glancing back to make sure Guillaume had definitely left he carefully stuck his hand in and pulled out what had been left crumpled in it.

Its hard cover broken, its pages torn and wet, was one of Enjolras' textbooks. Had to be, not only was Bahorel sure he'd seen Enjolras studying from it but when he flipped throw the water-ruined pages he could see the smudged remnants of Enjolras' writing in the margins.

“If you're quite done?” he heard Guillaume demand as footsteps approached.

Quickly, Bahorel tossed the book into the box he was carrying, covering it with a jacket he'd found, and let the rest of the bowl fall into the trash just in time to be straightened up when Guillaume appeared, followed by Courfeyrac and Grantaire each carrying boxes.

“I said, are you done yet?” demanded Guillaume.

“Yeah, I'd say I'm finished here,” said Bahorel darkly, carefully placing the last few dishes in his box before folding it shut and carrying it out.

He didn't know what the fuck was going on, but he did know that he was without a doubt done here.


	7. Chapter 7

Enjolras sat down heavily in one of the campus coffee shops and dragged his hands down his face in exhaustion while he waited for his drink to be brought to him. It was his fourth day back at classes and he felt bone tired. Which was ridiculous, because he was used to going days on limitted sleep and caffeine, used to racing around campus to get between classes and clubs and meetings and jobs in time, used to balancing classwork with rallies and a social life, and that usually only made him feel _more_ fired up, _more_ enthusiastic to do everything. Most days he was a firecracker – as soon as a flame was lit under him there was nothing he could do but spin out, crackling and sparkling, shooting out colour and sound, and _fly_. Now though it was as if his flight path had reached its peak, the explosion done, and had finally fizzled out, leaving nothing but an unsatisfying and empty darkness behind him with nothing but the echoes of a better time ringing in his ears and shaking his restless fingers.

In the past few days what had he even managed to accomplish? He had texted his friends back properly for the first time in weeks, met up with some of them on campus or at Courfeyrac's, and had to deal with all the questions that followed it. Just resisting the urge to be annoyed or curt with his friends was hard enough, since he knew they were just concerned, but their probing questions had left him feeling unsettled and exposed.

_He had also been confronted by the fact that this... this_ everything _was slowly leaking out beyond him and his little bubble into the real world. When Courfeyrac and Grantaire had returned with boxes of his stuff from Guillaume's apartment, it had been with Bahorel in tow. He'd taken one look at Enjolras, dropped his box, and marched over to pull him into a bone-crushing hug. It was only pure shock that had stopped Enjolras from screaming, panic shooting through him with such intensity that he felt his muscles siege and voice get caught in his throat as he was grabbed, crushed, held down_ couldn't move–

_And then it was gone. He wasn't being forced down. He had to blink a few times before he was able to focus on Bahorel in front of him, to realize that he was still standing in Courfeyrac's apartment and that there were people around him that weren't... that weren't_ him _. Courfeyrac and Grantaire were both hovering just behind Bahorel's shoulders, looking as tense and freaked out as Enjolras felt, like they were a second away from jumping in a dragging Bahorel back if they needed to._

_Enjolras didn't want to need that, even if a part of him did feel like peeling his skin off just to get the feeling of being touched off. He took a breath. And another. Tried to focus on what Bahorel was saying, because if the confused look he was giving Enjolras was any proof he'd obviously been talking._

“ _What the fuck did he do to you?” Bahorel asked again after a moment._

_Enjolras... actually hadn't planned what to say if someone asked him that directly. He had had a hard enough time imagining getting up each day, never mind planning for eventualities and fall-outs. So for a few minutes he had stood in silence debating whether to lie or not but in the end it had been that bone-deep exhaustion that had made his mind up for him. He didn't have the energy to lie any more._

“ _He hurt me,” he told Bahorel. Because he had. And sometimes Enjolras could even believe it._

_When Bahorel reached out to hug him again though Enjolras jerked back, hard enough that he nearly tripped backwards, making Bahorel pause, arms still out, expression shocked and horrified._

_The guilt nearly choked Enjolras' words but he forced them out because this wasn't Guillaume, it was Bahorel, and he_ wished _he wanted to be held by him. He had meant to explain, to tell Bahorel he appreciated his support and friendship, to explain that he would appreciate the hug normally but just couldn't deal with it right now. Instead all he said was “I'm sorry.” To say anything more at that moment was impossible._

“ _Nothing to be sorry for, man,” said Bahorel. “I'm sorry. Shouldn't have... that was dumb – what_ the fuck _did he–?”_

“ _Drop it,” muttered Courfeyrac, and Bahorel, miraculously, did. Though he still had a hard look in his eyes._

_Enjolras inched forwards and patted Bahorel's hand, hoping that he could somehow convey everything he couldn't seem to find the words to say, to make Bahorel understand how much that little touch cost him and how much he wanted to give it. And just maybe it worked because Bahorel just smiled at him._

_That had been a moment that had truly pushed Enjolras into seeking the rest of his friends out. He hadn't realized just how much he had missed them all, how much he had needed this, until that very moment. The sheer relief of knowing that they didn't hate him (not like the little voice that sounded oh-so-much like Guillaume whispered they must, after he treated them so badly, after he was so cruel, after he ignored them for so long) gave him a desire for something other than disappearing under the blankets of a bed and never needing to emerge._

_It had still left Enjolras drained though, even if he hadn't been forced to admit to everything, even if he never had to say that it was his fault too, that he was broken, that he had created a reason for the ra– for Guillaume to be angry. So did the knowledge that sooner or later everyone would know._

-

It was the _click_ of a mug being placed down (a mug falling, breaking, burning liquid and bruising, his fault, his mess, “ _don't bother”_ ) that drew him from his thoughts, and the smiling face of the barista who had delivered it that calmed Enjolras' racing heart and made him remember to breathe. Enjolras gave her what he hoped was a friendly nod – he didn't think he could manage a smile – and pulled the coffee to him, letting its warmth seep into his hands.

-

_At least the fear wasn't as bad today. The first day back on campus he had tried to convince himself he was ready for this. Had tried to convince himself that he wasn't regretting turning down Grantaire's offer._

_He hadn't managed to make it to his first class because he had instead been convinced that he'd heard Guillaume's laugh when he'd turned a hallway. It was only because he was getting a disconcerting amount of practice that he had been able to recognize the panic prickling up his spine or the feeling of light-headed terror before he broke down in the hallway, even after realizing the person who'd laughed had been some red-bearded man who didn't look or sound at all like Guillaume. Rather than going to his first class though, Enjolras had sat in a bathroom stall he'd only just managed to get to before his knees fell out from under him and he had collapsed onto the floor, trying to draw a breath back into his lungs and convince himself he wasn't about to be dragged away._

_Fifteen minutes after the attack had eased Enjolras still sat in that stall, too tired to feel grossed out as he pressed his forehead against his school bag and tried to decide whether or not he could get away with giving up and going back to the apartment and texting Courfeyrac._

_(Always expecting others to bend over backwards for you, hissed a little voice in his head. Taking without giving a thing in return – you think Courfeyrac wants to spend more time out of class because you can't do something as simple as go to your poli sci lecture? How arrogant can you be? How selfish?)_

_At some point during that time though, a snapchat had come through on his phone, the ping of the notification once again a surprising reminder that the outside world existed._

_It was just some picture sent by Grantaire, of his one of his profs with a very unflattering face drawn over top – a picture which even done by a finger on a little touch screen outshone anything Enjolras had ever tried to draw. The caption wasn't even that funny but Enjolras still found himself laughing at it, almost desperately._

_He had made his second class that day. He'd sent a text to Courfeyrac telling him he felt a little sick but was going to try to get through his class. Courfeyrac had sent him back a string of smiley faces and the insistence that if he needed anything to text, and he would see him at the apartment later if nothing else._

-

By the time half the cup had been drunk, Enjolras felt somewhat better. It was his fourth day. It hadn't been without some hiccups, but he had made it to over half his classes. His teachers had been understanding, hadn't pried, not after the email he'd sent them (one he had spent over an hour on, pacing and speaking it aloud to Courfeyrac as he tried to figure out how to explain his situation. It had almost been familiar, if it weren't for the topic and the tremours it left him with, Enjolras could have almost imaged he was just trying to pen a tricky essay), and had helped him figure out how he could catch up. It felt good to be in his favourite coffee shop again, with the familiar barista with her friendly smile and wild, dyed hair, and the rich, espresso-laced drink he favoured.

It just felt good to be productive again, to see the campus again. As much as he loved Courfeyrac's apartment, as much as he could never truly express how grateful he was for being let back in even though it by rights should be Marius living in there with Courf right now, it felt like a homecoming to see his school campus again. Even if the wide open space and the crowds had seemed like poorly veiled threats.

He had a textbook open in front of him, flipping through one of the chapters he'd fallen behind in, when he felt a tap on his shoulder. For a moment his stomach lurched but he took another sip of his coffee and settled himself. He couldn't jump at every shadow, couldn't panic at every laugh. It was probably the barista ask if there was anything she could help him with, or maybe even a classmate or a friend who had spotted him.

So he turned feeling confident.

Until the exact moment he realized the hand was still resting on his shoulder. Until the moment he looked up and saw Guillaume standing over him.

 

_Scream_ , a part of his mind said. _Don't make a sound_ , the rest begged. Instead of doing either Enjolras gagged and stood. Guillaume was still taller. His hand was still on his shoulder.

_It's crowded and busy, we're at school, there's campus security, he can't do anything, he can't do anything, he can't do anything, he can't do anything..._

“Enjolras,” Guillaume breathed, and it was so warm and relieved that it made Enjolras' head spin. “Fuck, I was hoping sooner or later I'd find you on campus, figured they couldn't be keeping you a total prisoner or whatever fucked up shit it going on...”

“What are you doing here?” Enjolras finally managed.

Guillaume shrugged, taking a step closer even as Enjolras stumbled back. His hand didn't leave his shoulder.

“It's your favourite coffee shop. I thought... maybe... you might come back. Here, I mean. Might come back here. I just... I just wanted to see you, make sure my soulmate was okay.” He said it bashfully, like it was a secret. Like it was real.

_This isn't real!_ roared a voice in his head that sounded like Grantaire.

“I'm fine,” said Enjolras, stepping back and pulling his arm away. Took a step back, a few more, turned without really knowing what he was going to do, just with the single need to _get away_ screaming in his mind, when an arm clamped around his arm. Enjolras' knees trembled and he nearly pitched straight to the ground but the arm tightened before he could fall.

“You're hurting me,” said Enjolras, feeling distant. Because he didn't actually think that mattered anymore. At one point he'd thought Guillaume would be worried about hurting him but had learnt better since then. But he still had to say it. Had to make himself understand. This man was hurting him.

His soulmate was hurting him and his soulmate _didn't care_.

But then, to his surprised, Guillaume's hand jumped away from his arm, leaving only the feeling of phantom fingers pressed against his skin.

“Shit, ange, I'm so sorry,” said Guillaume, his hands coming up to cup Enjolras' face. “I just... you've scared me so much. I thought you would run away again – I haven't seen you in ages, I didn't know what had happened to you or if you were okay. I just didn't want you to leave again before I'd at least heard you say that you were... that you were safe. And okay. And happy. God, please tell me you're okay.”

Enjolras stared – Guillaume looked like he was about to cry. His chest clenched he didn't– he didn't want Guillaume to cry.

Guillaume stroked his thumb along Enjolras cheek bone, so tender, so soft, Enjolras wanted to curl up in it. It felt like so long since he had been held. (He remembered Bahorel's crushing hold – this was nothing like that, this was soft.)

(No, that was wrong. Bahorel hadn't hurt him. Guillaume had hurt him. Even if he wasn't hurting him now.)

“I've missed you, ange. I don't understand what happened. Please, talk to me?”

How could Guillaume not understand? It was obvious. It had to be obvious. Wasn't it obvious?

“I missed you,” said Enjolras. But that wasn't right. But it was. He had missed _this_ Guillaume. The gentle one, that touched him gently and reminded him that he was loved. He just wanted this Guillaume to stay.

Guillaume smiled wide, relieved ( _toothy, snarling_ ) looking like someone had given him back something precious that he had believed lost forever ( _like a dog off its leash or prey cornered_ ). His hands stayed around Enjolras' face and he leaned in, pressed his lips to Enjolras'. “I love you, ange. Please, come talk to me. I want to figure out what's happened. Your friends have been acting crazy, they haven't even let me see you.”

“ _Okay_.” The word was on the tip of his tongue, but Enjolras bit it down seconds before he could say it. Because in a rush every nerve in his body seemed to prickle, screaming _NO_ , as loudly as they could. No, no, no, no, this wouldn't just be talking. Did he really want to go with Guillaume? ( _Yes. No. Yes._ ) Did he really want to be alone in a room with him? ( _Yes. No. NO._ ) Enjolras tried to breathe, to remember what had happened the last time he was alone in a room with Guillaume. He could still feel freezing, wet socks stuck to his feet, could still feel the terror-relief of falling onto a cold city bus.

“I can't right now, Gui,” said Enjolras. Guillaume frowned and Enjolras expected to feel his fingers tighten along his jaw but instead his finger just kept soothingly rubbing its path along his cheek. “I– I have classes still.” It was a lie, and a bad one. Guillaume knew it; he knew Enjolras schedule. (He knew Enjolras' schedule, knew where to find him on campus, knew what coffee shops he drank at, he couldn't escape, why was he still trying to escape?) “I'll text you later?” Enjolras offered instead.

For a moment it looked like Guillaume would argue, but then his fingers loosened and fell away, cage bars falling open and Enjolras breathed again.

“Okay. Promise me? I've missed you, ange.” Another kiss pressed to Enjolras' mouth.

“I promise.” He tried to smile. “I'll see you later, I should run.”

“Right. I will see you later.”

Enjolras nodded and slung his bag over his back, walking away as quickly as he could without looking like he was running, not minding that his coffee was still half full on the table. Guillaume's words had sounded more like a promise than Enjolras' had.

-

Enjolras was lying on his bed when he heard Courf come home and didn't bother responding when Courf shouted a greeting. He didn't know what to do. A part of him wanted to tell Courfeyrac what had happened but he couldn't quite convince himself to. This was his problem and he needed to fix it without getting Courfeyrac anymore wrapped up in it than he had.

(And a part of him knew that Courfeyrac would stop him from going to meet Guillaume. And the fact that he didn't know whether or not he wanted to be stopped scared him.)

He stared blankly at his phone. He had managed to accumulate a few more unanswered texts from his friends but the one that glared at him was from Guillaume.

_It was a relief to see you again :) hope you classes were good can't wait to talk again <3<3_

What was he supposed to do? There was no guidelines for something like this. The usual formula went: soulmate texts you, you get a thrilled jitter, you text back, add a dash of love and you ended with a lifetime of fulfilment and happiness – it wasn't supposed to be _hard_. But Enjolras had no love to give this text.

( _“Do you feel anything for anyone but your stupid causes? Do you even care about me?”_ )

Enjolras curled up on himself around his phone.

He needed to do something.

He _needed_ to do something.

Oddly enough it was a... strange feeling. The need to face a problem and work at it was something that was so familiar – this need for action, change, choice, revolution – but it had been absent for... well, more than the past two weeks, if Enjolras was being honest. It hadn't died on that rainy night. If anything, that race through the rain, the fear and desperation of it, that had fanned it back from embers. It had been dying since it was confronted with Guillaume's apartment, the neatness of it, the way Enjolras never quite fit into it properly, the way the bed smelt, and the way the carpet felt permanent embedded into his back and ass and thighs like a tattoo. It had all pressed down on him until there had left nothing left but this empty hole that had left Enjolras listless and confused. But as he thought about the phone in his hand, the text message on it, the fear of seeing Guillaume again, the fear that had accompanied him for the past for days, for the past two weeks, for the past _months_ , the indecision and the fear of the future, he could feel that drive settling back over him like it had never left.

An anger normally focussed on the injustices of the world, on inequalities and future hopes and present needs, had a new focus and it made Enjolras sit up and grab for his laptop. He needed help. He opened the computer and listened with a deep satisfaction at the familiar whirr of its fan. Because some things needed to be done, and for the first time in a long time, anger, indignation, _drive_ outweighed the fear and disgust that had stopped him before.

With a deep breath he let the internet snap open and his fingers form words on the keyboard, a word that felt like it had been sitting on his fingertips for months, waiting to come out once more.

_Fantine_

 


	8. Chapter 8

Enjolras stared down at the phone in his hand. Bright and smiling, a picture of Courfeyrac's face was the only light besides for the rush of street lamps out in the dark. He should text him, Enjolras thought. After everything that had happened, Courfeyrac would very likely worry if he work up and found Enjolras gone.

But somehow that worry seemed crushing at the moment. Sometimes it was a comfort, to realize that there was actually someone out there that would be concerned for him when they saw the marks left by Guillaume ( _that_ had been _left. Past tense. They were gone now, all of them. Bruises faded until it was like they had never been there, even without the careful application of make-up. Somehow time seemed even more false than cover up though. You couldn't run a thumb along Time and reveal the horrors of the past, they were gone, nothing but a story for Enjolras to tell and hope others believed. It was an unsettling thought, but it was also accompanied by the memory of Grantaire's hand on his face, and Enjolras wasn't sure if that was unsettling or comforting, which in and of itself was unsettling. It was an exhausting line of thought_ ). Sometimes, like now, it was just exhausting. To carry the weight of that many people's concerns, to be the cause of it, to know he could make the worry go away if only he ( _stopped being selfish, stopped being absorbed in himself, thought about others for a change_ ) stopped making everything about what had happened between him and Guillaume.

There was something strangely liberating about not having anyone worry about him right now, in the darkness of the pre-dawn. He felt like he had fallen into some nowhere space, something transient and separate, where no one else existed but himself. Not Courfeyrac and his worry, not the rest of his friends who he still needed to talk to, not his soulmate. A part of him remembered a taxi ride he had taken so, so long ago in the dim, early morning to a police station. There was none of the frenzy that had been on that trip though, no fear of what-ifs. The what-ifs had happened.

Now there was simply him, and the bruises that didn't exist any longer, sitting on a carrier bus whisked him past dark fields that were broken only by occasional whizz of lights from other people who were driving the freeway at such an early hour and the pools of orange light that flicked by regularly, like tiny islands to remind you that the rest of the world existed and hadn't faded into the greyish pre-dawn light just cresting the mountains. He was free. Without really thinking about it, he turned off his phone and leaned his head against the cold, rattling bus window and felt himself begin to doze.

-

_Enjolras woke with the feeling of eyes on him, of the feeling of hands hovering just inches from his skin. This was common enough now though that he simply jerked upright, a heavy, choking gasp catching in his throat, otherwise silent in the quiet darkness of the apartment. He rarely woke from nightmares violently or loudly enough to wake Courfeyrac anymore, or Marius if he was over._

_That took some getting use to. Now that Marius knew that Enjolras was around again – now that everyone knew he was around and staying with Courfeyrac – Marius had started coming over again. Technically Marius had never really moved into Enjolras' old room – in fact it had still held some of Enjolras' old furniture that he hadn't been able to take to Guillaume's or otherwise deal with – since he was much more interested in sleeping with his soulmate, but by rights it was Marius' room Enjolras was now occupying. It wasn't just the vague feeling of being an intruder though, or even the way he felt sick at the thought of two soulmates sleeping happily together like they were supposed to only feet from him, but simply the horror at the thought of Marius of all people realize how affected Enjolras was, or realizing what exactly had happened because of something he might shout in his sleep. He still hadn't even told Combeferre. All most of them knew right now was simply that something had happened between Enjolras and Guillaume, and that he didn't want to talk about it – by the way most people would mention Guillaume to him, about how they'd seen him recently, about how much he said he missed Enjolras, how sad and lonely he looked – it was pretty obvious that most of them assumed it was just a rough patch and they'd be back together sooner or later. And maybe they were right. Could you avoid your soulmate for your entire life? Would Enjolras be happy being alone for the rest of his life?_

_These thoughts rattled around in Enjolras' head, filling the silence of the apartment that wasn't already filled with imagined noises of someone who wasn't supposed to be there, and he curled up with his back to the headboard, forehead pressed against his knees as he tried to measure his breathing the way Grantaire had suggested. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it worked well enough that at least Courfeyrac and Marius stayed peaceful and asleep one room over._

_Logically, Enjolras knew he was being ridiculous. The apartment was locked, there were four doors between his bed and outside the apartment building, none of which had opened or closed, and he was much too high up for anyone to be at his window no matter how much he felt like he was being watched. There was no one here._ Guillaume was not here.

_It didn't stop Enjolras from feeling like Guillaume was about to climb onto the bed any minute and hold him down and – Enjolras pressed a knuckle into his mouth and bit down hard, trying to distract himself... and to keep himself from making any noise._

_It didn't help. No matter how hard he was pushing the panic away it kept crawling back, along with the sense that there was no way to escape this, that he would come, he_ always _came._

_He was on the brink of a panic attack and he knew it._

_He should wake Courfeyrac up. Objectively, Enjolras was pretty sure that was the smartest idea – he couldn't stand being alone, needed his friend – but Courfeyrac had an early seminar tomorrow and had been up late writing a paper. He couldn't do it, Courfeyrac didn't deserve it._

-

The bus slowed as it turned off the freeway and Enjolras blinked awake from against the window, woken by the change in momentum. Dawn had truly broken now, casting orange light and deep shadows across the roadway. For a moment Enjolras considered sitting up, taking out his phone again, but it would be a little while yet before they were at the bus depot. God, he was tired. He was tired so often these days. Sleep was hard and sporatic, coming only after hours of fretful, circling thoughts, and scattering every time a nightmare reared its head. Normally he didn't sleep well in vehicles, not with the hard edges and endless bumping, but right now, in this bubble of unreality that was a bus in the early morning, he found himself drifting off dreamlessly. They hadn't even truly made it off the exit before Enjolras' eyes had blinked shut once more.

-

_He couldn't get up to wake Courfeyrac, but he also knew he couldn't stay sitting in this dark room waiting for nothing to happen. The more he curled in on himself on the bed the heavier the darkness curled in on him, the more he felt like he was back in Guillaume's apartment wondering if tonight would be a good night or not._

_Finally, the anxiety of sitting still outweighed the fear of opening the bedroom door and risking someone being on the other side, and Enjolras got up to walk quietly into the living room. Sure enough, the only thing there to be watching him was the pictures of their friends that Courfeyrac, ever the shutterbug, had printed and tacked onto the sides of their cheap bookshelves. They were all done on poor quality printer paper, colour grainy and smudged, some even with snapchat captions, but Courfeyrac and Enjolras both loved them. It was in front of them that Enjolras paced down, staring into Bossuet's laughing face and Jehan's joy and Feuilly's smile. He wasn't alone, he was surrounded, he was safe, and they watched over him until his breathing was a little more even and he was exhausted, sleep pulling down on every limb. He lay down on the couch, thinking just maybe he might be able to fall asleep there, but each time his eyelids started to droop Guillaume was there along with the sense of inevitability and responsibility that accompanied him these days. Inevitably, Enjolras would jerk back to awareness, until he felt on the verge of crying; he just wanted to sleep. He just wanted to sleep._

-

By the time the bus had pulled into the station the sun was up in earnest and even though it was still early there was a distinct sense that people were beginning to start their day. Enjolras shrugged his book bag over his shoulder and passed the people who were collecting luggage by the bus. For now he would go find a coffeeshop and get breakfast; it was too early to do anything else.

He had never actually meant to leave this early, but after several days of research a vague idea had germinated into a plan, which had finally grown so big that it took over every other thought until, in the middle of a bad night, Enjolras had gotten out of bed, thrown his wallet, phone, laptop, a water bottle, and some granola bars into his bag and silently slunk out of the apartment. There had been something unnerving about walking the streets when it so late after his frantic escape in the rain, especially since the city buses weren't running that late and he'd have to walk the entire way to the bus depot, but it was a clear, bright night and he was warm in his coat and shoes. It was easy to think about his dry socks and the phone safely in his pocket when his mind travelled back to the feeling that Guillaume was still out there, hunting for him. He could have waited until morning, could have told Courf about his plan, caught a bus or a ride with a friend – he was sure any number of them would have been happy to go shopping a couple towns over for the day – but it had become something he needed to do. Something that couldn't wait. So here he was, when only the only other people awake were those making their commute to work or a few people jogging in the cool, morning air, or little old couples walking dogs.

Once he had found an open bakery where he could get a bagel and, more importantly, a coffee, he settled in to pull up Google Maps. He still wasn't sure if this was a good idea or not, just new that it was an idea, and good or not it wasn't one he could ignore. At least it was something. It had taken a long time of digging, but if there was anything that years of university research papers and running socio-political blogs had taught him, it was how to dig up sources. So for several days, when he wasn't working on homework he tried to suppress any thought of Guillaume under tireless research. If he couldn't stand to read another chapter but had an hour before he was meeting up with Combeferre: research. If he was sitting on campus between classes and constantly checking over his shoulder to see if Guillaume was also there: research. If he had woken up in the middle of the night and was sitting alone but no where near alone enough: research. Finally it had paid off, and he had an address for Fantine.

What would she think about some student coming to bother her unannounced? Enjolras was not a particularly shy person, but even he suspected knew that this would hardly be a welcome visit – from the articles Enjolras had had to dig through, she had probably had more than a lifetime worth of people invading her privacy. But had no where else to turn. If anyone knew what was happening to him... if anyone knew what to do... it would be her.

So Enjolras drank his coffee slowly and waited for the hours to tick by.

He needed help, help his friends couldn't offer.

-

_Enjolras stood up from the couch again, wanting to scream out of pure frustration. He was so tired. So damn tired. Soon he might need to pull out his make-up again to cover the bruises under his eyes rather than the ones he'd use to carry on his arms, he thought with bitter, empty humour. Somehow Guillaume was still hurting his body, was still making a bed something fearful, something he had to avoid._

_Pressing his hands to his eyes, Enjolras tried to stop his thoughts. These weren't helping. They weren't healthy. He needed to stop. He couldn't. Couldn't do anything. Couldn't love his soulmate, couldn't be loved, couldn't make it stop when he finally gave up on the charade that had been their relationship, couldn't even sleep. Finally, after agonizing minutes of waffling he pulled out his phone in desperation and went to his most recently used contact, hitting call. He almost hung up three times before the call connected and he was answered by a sleepy grunt._

_It was, after all, just past three in the morning. “Sorry,” Enjolras said automatically._

“ _Enj?” a sleepy voice slurred and Enjolras had to bite his lip not to say... not to say something. He wasn't even sure. His chest swelled with emotions though, hearing that voice in the dark._

“ _Yeah.”_

_The voice sounded a bit more awake after that. “Are you okay?”_

_Ah, there was that sense of guilt. Worrying everyone. Inconsiderate of his friends, only worrying about himself and his needs, not even stopping to think that they might have a life outside him, might want to be doing things like_ sleep _rather than listening to Enjolras panic. As if Grantaire didn't get enough of that during the day. God, he must be sick of Enjolras, probably wishing he had never got involved in this mess and – and the thought of Grantaire getting tired of him was actually a really distressing though at three am._

“ _I'm fine,” Enjolras said, “I shouldn't have woken you up. Sorry.”_

“ _Nah, it's fine,” said Grantaire, followed by a creaking that sounded like Grantaire was sitting up. “I get calls at way weirder hours about way weirder things from Joly all the time. One time he called me at half-two because he was wondering if centipedes were sentient if they could make up for their lack of opposable thumbs with their sheer number of legs and create an tiny, insectiod Industrial Revolution. I'm assuming he called me after Musichetta kicked him out of bed. You don't want to know about centipede industry, do you?”_

_Enjolras smiled and leaded back against the arm of the couch. That did sound like Joly. “No, no centipedes, I promise.”_

_He's only humouring you, said the voice in his head. He wants you to leave him alone. Joly's different, he's been friends with Joly for a long time, before he ever met you. You don't matter, you're annoying. But with the thought of Joly and Grantaire discussing invertebrate society at two in the morning made it a lot easier to recognize that the voice in his head sounded a lot like Guillaume, and the doubts it whispered as things that never use to worry him._

_When did it get so hard to believe he was loved?_

“ _Well that's good at least,” said Grantaire. “Though I do have to wonder, what sort of two-am-and-sleep-deprived thoughts does someone like you have? Dreams of the glorious revolution? What if Trump's toupee came to life and strangled him in his sleep?”_

Thoughts of my soulmate walking into my room and raping me and it feeling like something that deserved to happen, _Enjolras didn't say. He had a feeling Grantaire knew, and he was grateful Grantaire hadn't said it either._

“ _I'm usually asleep at two,” said Enjolras. “Or working on papers.”_

“ _Yeah, but everyone has those what-the-fuck-did-I-just-think middle of the night thoughts!” insisted Grantaire. “Like what would happen if you could, y'know, control each follicle of your hair individually? Would it make your hair more or less messy? Can you imagine trying to coordinate that many different little... limbs? I guess?”_

_Enjolras laugh honestly at that. “What?”_

“ _Come on, you've got to think weird shit like that sometimes. I mean maybe not the hair thing because your hair is literal perfection, it's probably ascended to some higher level so maybe you are already one with it.”_

“ _Clearly you've never seen my bedhead.”_

“ _I'm not sure I believe you get bedhead. I think that's a myth.”_

_Enjolras reached over a flicked on his lamp, before opening snapchat. He had never used it much, only to occasionally update his story, usually about club activities or rallies he wanted to let people know about, and he hadn't touched it in weeks. Longer, even. Even before... everything. He had felt weirdly guilty about sending his picture to other people while he was with Guillaume, like he had been giving away something that wasn't his._

_With that thought in his throat, he snapped a picture of himself with a sort of petty pleasure and sent it to Grantaire._

“ _Oh my god, you look like something climbed into your hair and decided to live there. Maybe one of Joly's centipedes.”_

_Enjolras laughed in the dark. At the dark. Whatever._

-

Finishing up a conclusion for a paper one of his professors had given him an extension on, Enjolras closed his laptop at five minutes to noon. Late enough that almost everyone would be awake and going about their day. With jittering nerves, he packed the laptop up, threw away the third cofffee cup he'd gone through that morning, and made sure he had the correct address punched into Google Maps before heading out. It should only be a twenty minute walk from here. Then Fantine wouldn't just be a furtive name he found online and tried to hide, but someone he could speak to, face-to-face.

Even in the bright, morning sunlight, he felt like he was laughing at the dark.

 


	9. Chapter 9

Enjolras stood before the door and marshalled his confidence. Gold numbers read 132 and informed him that this was the right house – or at least, that it should be. Unless the address he had so painstakingly uncovered was a fake one, or an old one, or it had belonged to another Fantine, or any number of things that could have lead him to disturbing a perfect stranger. And what if it wasn't actually Fantine? What if some person opened the door and he asked for Fantine and the stranger remembered the old news story and realized the shame that lurked in Enjolras' shadow?

Enjolras gave a huff and an internal shake. He could knock on a door. He had spent more than enough time canvassing over the years that it should be second nature. So not giving himself another chance to talk himself out of it, Enjolras gave the door a polite rap and took a step back to wait.

He didn't have to wait long. It soon opened and a woman stood in the frame, brow furrowing when she was met by the sight of an unfamiliar young man. Instead of somehow reading Enjolras' mind and slamming the door in his face to keep back his wrongness, she simply, politely, asked how she could help him.

For a moment Enjolras lost his voice entirely, immediately, horribly aware that this couldn't be Fantine. She looked too... well, too _normal_. She couldn't be much older than forty, and had bright, yellow hair, cut short around her head so that it seemed more like her head had been decliately enrobed in shimmering gold leaf. It looked nothing like the wan, blonde hair that the Fantine in the pictures had had, hanging in long sheets around her head, as if even it were exhausted. This woman's face wasn't drawn or pinched, but rather round and full and filled with colour. She stood before him, looking at ease, comfortable. There was no way this was the face of someone who was severed from her soulmate; there was no way this was someone who was mutilating an inherent part of herself like Enjolras was.

“Excuse me,” were the words Enjolras more felt leave his mouth than actually intended to say, “but are you Fantine Tholomyès?”

-

“ _...Really? I thought if anyone would be interested, it would be you.”_

_Combeferre gave a little start. In all honesty, in the seconds between dismissing Guillaume and looking back down at his phone, he had nearly forgotten the man entirely. But now that he had been reminded of him that caustic little curl of hate unwound in his gut._

_Which wasn't entirely fair, he tried to tell himself. Combeferre had always prided himself in avoiding most of the convoluted drama that seemed to follow on some people's coattails. Courfeyrac, for example, was exactly that sort of person. He seemed to thrive off drama, and he had found an excellent friend in Bossuet who was usually happy to sit down and gossip with him. The fickle loves and rivalries though, the barbed, biased words that turned one friend against another, without the other ever learning what had caused it – at best they made Combeferre tired, at worst they made him furious. And yet that was exactly what had struck him now. He was trying to shut Guillaume out. Because Guillaume was right, normally Combeferre would have jumped at Guillaume's suggestion that he come to help at a public library program that Guillaume had helped organize. But right now the thought of doing anything with Guillaume made his teeth clench._

_It wasn't fair though. Combeferre really had no reason to dislike Guillaume right now. Guillaume had never been anything but warm and friendly to Combeferre – to any of Les Amis as far as Combeferre knew – and it had only been on Courfeyrac and Grantaire's vague words that the seed of doubt had been planted in Combeferre's chest. Given that Grantaire and Guillaume's animosity towards one another wasn't exactly a secret, it made an especially unreliable source._

_And yet there were also Courfeyrac's long, heavy looks that seemed to plague him lately._

_There was Bahorel's sudden impatience towards Guillaume._

_And of course there was Enjolras' disappearance, his silence, his continued absence from ABC meetings. There had been Enjolras' unexpected (long awaited, relieving, unsettling) text._

I'm okay. Guillaume and I are having some problems right now. I'm dealing with it.

_By all rights that should have put an end to Combeferre's concerns. Ah, “_ problems _”. How much time had Combeferre spent in high school hearing about people and their problems. Friend A had insulted Friend B's music taste and it had blown out of proportion. Person C and Person D couldn't wait to find their soulmates and were “keeping each other company” in the mean time, and the unimaginable levels of drama that always followed that sort of mess. Or, as was most likely right now: Person E and Person G had just found out they were soulmates and after the initial, blinding glow they had realized they were both still real people that needed to learn to live with each other. So Enjolras and Guillaume had hit a rough patch, and Enjolras had taken it a bit too much to heart – almost unsurprisingly, really, given Enjolras penchant for strong emotions and his complete inexperience in romantic matters. That was no reason for Combeferre to take sides._

_No reason at all._

-

“Are you Fantine Tholomyès?” Enjolras asked.

Immediately the ease and colour were shed from the woman's face.

“No,” the woman replied sharply, and suddenly the door had snapped shut in Enjolras' face.

Lost. Enjolras felt lost. He was standing in the exact same place he had since he'd walked up to the house ten minutes ago and stood fretting on the stoop, but now the goal that he had been clinging to had crumbled under his grip without him noticing. Somehow, he had felt as if he had been holding onto the edge of a cliff, dangling over an abyss but, for the moment, had been secure. With a single word he had suddenly realized that not only had his hold failed him but he had been no where near the top of this proverbial mountain, and now he could feel his mind falling down, down, down into a place that came with shallow breathes and panic and tears.

No.

He couldn't. He couldn't turn around and head home now. He couldn't. He couldn't.

He knocked on the door again, less polite, more urgent. He wrung his hands. No one answered. He was about to knock again when he realized there was a small doorbell, half hidden behind a stalk of flowers that were growing out of a pot on a bench by the door. He pressed that instead and waited. Pressed it again. Prayed wordlessly. Please. Please.

The door opened again, but this time it wasn't the woman. A mountain of a man stood in the doorway. His hair and beard were grey, but there was a youthful, strong bearing to his entire body, and the way he filled to door frame, the way his arms like twin tree trunks crossed over a broad chest, didn't let anyone mistake this man for elderly or weak, not for a second. With the man glaring down at him Enjolras' mind scrambled – was this that woman's soulmate? So Enjolras had been wrong about everything after all. Had this man come out to protect his soulmate from the crazed stranger on their doorstep?

“The person you're looking for isn't here,” the man rumbled warningly.

“Please, my name is Enjolras, and I just... I need to speak to Fantine,” he said weakly, as if that would somehow make her appear, make this situation fix itself, make his heart rate even out again. “It's important. I... I...” He didn't know what to say. Didn't know what he could say out in the open, on a suburban street under the sun – everything he could say were dark things to be whispered and hidden. He was broken. He had come to find another broken person. Instead he had found a beautiful woman and her soulmate and had almost touched them with a horrible thing that shouldn't exist.

As is realizing something even Enjolras hadn't, the man's expression softened. Reaching out, the man made to touch the shoulder of the wide-eyed young man in front of him, to calm him.

Enjolras didn't see this though. Instead he saw the large hand of a large, towering man coming near his face. And then he felt _a hard floor under his back and pain up and down his thighs and the face of a different, large man looming over him, hand slamming against his face._ I'll need to wear make-up tomorrow, _he thought distantly, as he felt his throat tighten. He wasn't sure what he was upset about. Needing to go through another tense day wondering if someone would notice something wrong with his face, or knowing that he had again done something so wrong his soulmate was mad at him, or the pain itself. Or the distant, awful thought lingering in the back of his mind, wishing this could just stop happening. Wishing terrible things on his soulmate._

Suddenly the dimness of Guillaume's apartment faded and was again replaced with bright, afternoon sunlight, but it didn't dispel the adrenaline that was shooting through Enjolras' veins. He nearly fell in his attempt to get away from the hand. Barely looked back as he turned and started to run. _Running again, he was running again, he was tired of running._ Distantly, he thought maybe he had taken the time to apologize before doing so, had tried to keep up some semblance of normalcy, but he couldn't be sure. All that mattered was that he was wrong, he was lost, he was alone, and he needed to get away.

A voice called after him.

_A voice yelled at him. “Stop screaming,” it said. A hit. Touches that left slime on his skin and purple bruises and dragged his body down, hot and impaled, to a depth that made him want to claw his skin off to be free of it. “Stop acting like you don't like it,” the voice yelled. “Stop being so selfish. Stop being so arrogant. Stop thinking your so above it all,” it yelled. “You think you matter to them,” it whispered. It lied. It revealed, made him see horrible truths that made him want to curl in on himself and hate everything he had ever said. But mostly, it yelled._

_(No, that wasn't right. It also laughed. Spoke softly. Reassured. Quoted ancient philosophers and movies they had watched together on weekends. Told him that it loved him.)_

“ _I love you, ange,” it said._

“ _I love you,” he parroted back, with his eyes closed so he wouldn't have to stare up into the eyes of his soulmate that loomed above him, so that he could pretend that he liked this. “I love you.”_

 


	10. Chapter 10

Fantine existed.

Just because he hadn't found her, just because he had found a happy woman and man, just because there had been soulmates who lived together and protected each other in her place, didn't mean she didn't exist. There were news articles that proved she did. Even if those articles were nothing but forgotten columns in an old newspaper.

Unless after the tragedy and horror of the media's story had died down she had simply disappeared. Stopped being. Unless she had been left as only half a person, someone who, without the person meant to complete her, had simply faded away. Or maybe she really had been committed to a mental hospital. Maybe she had been... _wrong_ , somehow, broken, for feeling like she did about her soulmate, and maybe they had taken her quietly away to help fix her.

Or maybe, maybe she had gone simply gone back to her soulmate. Maybe there _wasn't_ a broken, lost Fantine who was fighting her soulmate and fighting society and fighting the law out there for Enjolras to find because there wasn't one to find anymore. Maybe things had worked out and she had gone back to her soulmate to live the happily ever after she had been promised.

Fantine existed, Enjolras reminded himself. But it didn't stop it from feeling like if she had, it had been only like a myth existed. A myth couldn't help you. A myth didn't stop you from being alone.

_(Unless it was a myth spoken from the other end of a phone line, late into the night, by the only voice you had wanted to hear. Unless it was a myth that you had told yourself again and again for no reason other than its familiar words were like hug that didn't cause panic. Unless it a myth that had been carved into paper, held gently in your hand in the middle of the night while a monster slept behind you.)_

The bus ride home from the city was very different from the ride in. It wasn't as dark this time, but it was getting there, the sun setting behind the mountain and casting long shadows down the road. Several long hours had passed before Enjolras had finally found the will to head home. First he had run until he had collapsed against a bus stop where he had sat on the ground, head pressed against the dirty seat, and sobbed, without even knowing what he was crying over. Just cried and cried as people walked uncomfortable around him, as if they could tell there was something wrong with him, tell he was tainted, tell at a glance what Enjolras had done to his soulmate. When the tears had finally stopped, Enjolras had walked listlessly until he had stumbled across a public library, where he curled up in a corner seat and dozed, not sure what else he could do and suddenly feeling exhausted by the day. Eventually though, he had picked up his feet and shuffled his way back to the bus stop, to return home.

Sitting on the bus though, Enjolras thought. Thought about myths. For someone who'd never really been that interested in fiction previously, this was just one more strange way his life had taken a violent twist. But mostly he thought about Fantine, and Grantaire. Maybe it didn't matter if Fantine was only a myth, because he still did have something grounding him, didn't he? Everyone know what Grantaire thought about soulmates. No one knew much more than that, but Grantaire definitely had opinions, and flirted with people regardless of marks.

He had never thought to ask about it.

What was it that made Grantaire pull away from it all, even before Guillaume had crashed into Enjolras' life. Could a person really live without their other half? Could someone else really choose to reject them?

Maybe he didn't _need_ to find Fantine to figure it out. Maybe if he had only paid attention to his friends and thought to _ask._

He pulled out his phone, and after a moment's hesitation, called.

It took a moment to answer, and when it did Grantaire sounded mildly out of breath. “Hello? Enjolras? What's up, you okay?”

“I'm fine.” He didn't know how to ask what he wanted to ask, didn't know how to make it tactful and polite and unintrusive. He didn't have the energy to figure it out. So he dived right in. “Why do you hate soulmates?”

He could hear Grantaire's confusion on the other end of the line until he managed to pull himself back together. “Well, I can think of several good reasons to hate _one_ at least...”

“This isn't about Guillaume,” said Enjolras, perhaps a little sharply. Goddamn, was it impossible for anything in his life not to be touched by him.

Maybe not. He was his soulmate.

“This is about you. Why do _you_ hate soulmates. You were like this before we even met Guillaume. You've never gone looking for your soulmate. Why?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes.”

“Fine. She's dead. That's why.”

Oh. Enjolras felt like an idiot. Grantaire who had always scoffed at soulmates, who had always acted indifferent or above them, who Enjolras had accused on more than one occasion of being crude or inconsiderate for how he acted about soulmates, and now he knew the truth. Was it really surprising that Grantaire would be bitter, if he was one of those poor souls who met and lost his soulmate early. Given a taste of what could have been, and then forced to bear the weight of that for the rest of his life?

“I'm so sorry,” said Enjolras.

“Right... don't be,” said Grantaire, sounding awkward. Enjolras had done that. God, he had intruded in Grantaire's life in so many ways. “I mean it.”

“ _I_ mean it,” said Enjolras. “I... hadn't realized. I am sorry. I... I should go.”

“Enjolras, it's fine, you don't have–”

“Bye, Grantaire.” He hung up.

For a brief, glimmer moment, he had thought maybe this had been a choice for Grantaire too. Maybe he didn't need a Fantine, maybe the myth was real, maybe he could find some sort of promise for a future.

Now Enjolras stared down at the phone in his hand. Bright and smiling, a picture of Guillaume's face filled the screen. Running hadn't worked. When had running ever worked? The last time he had run he had ended up in the freezing rain with wet socks; the last time he had ended up in Courfeyrac's apartment, uprooting Courf's and Grantaire's life, worrying his friends, practically forcing Marius out of his home. Running didn't work. And he _had_ promised he would text.

_Hey_ , he finally typed. Just that. One word, no punctuation, no emoticon, no commitment beyond a word left dangling, unsure, too naked and bare to relay the anxiety hidden beneath each letter.

It didn't take more than a minute to get a reply.

_Hey <3_ And a little angel emoticon. Enjolras almost smiled at it. Guillaume was the only one that used that emoticon to stand in for his name, it was... sweet. A digital pet name.

_I missed seeing your name pop up on my phone,_ Guillaume continued, the warm little text bubble making the words look innocuous, gentle, warm. Enjolras had no reason to be afraid of something as simple as a text message.

With a sigh, Enjolras settled back in his bus seat as the sky darkened and prepared what he would message back.

-

“Hey,” said Courfeyrac, as soon as Enjolras walked in the door, “where were you?”

“I just had to go out,” said Enjolras. “Had to do some stuff.”

“Would you like some tacos?”

Startled, Enjolras looked up from where he had dropped his bag as soon as he'd gotten in the door. Sitting at the kitchen table was Courfeyrac and Marius, who were both, indeed, eating tacos.

“There's more than enough,” said Courfeyrac, and even though his voice was warm his expression was cautious, calculating.

Enjolras almost agreed – he was starving, he hadn't eaten since he'd picked at that breakfast in the coffee shop – but his phone seemed to burn hot in his pocket. _Yeah,_ Guillaume had texted him during their conversation on the bus home, _I've been trying to figure out what happened with you?_ Because apparently it wasn't obvious to Guillaume. Which was wrong, it was obvious what had happened... wasn't it? There had been.... screaming. A scene. A great escape. But that little text bubble had turned it into something trivial, unwarranted, another example of Enjolras' illogical drama ruining their lives. _No one's really been able to tell me anything. They've mostly just said you've been pretty needy lately._

He had been needy lately.

“...Would you like me to get you a plate?” Marius asked awkwardly, forcing Enjolras' buzzing thoughts away from his phone.

Tacos were a Thing for Courfeyrac and Marius, Enjolras knew that. Apparently they had met when Marius had been with Éponine at Grantaire's apartment making “fucking weird” tacos when he and Courfeyrac had met. Enjolras was relatively certain that Marius' soulmate mark even said something about tacos on it. Or vegetables. Something about food – he had only seen it the one time, it was normally covered by his shirt. So tacos had become a Thing for them. Something sweet and unique to them as soulmates, something that tied them back to their great, fated meeting.

Enjolras didn't want to intrude on that.

“No thanks, I ate while I was out,” he said, the lie rolling off his tongue. To think at one point he'd been so bad at them.

Skirting around the kitchen he disappeared back into his room. Later he would sneak out of his room, after Courfeyrac and Marius had gone to sleep in their bedroom, and raid the fridge. For right now, he should text Guillaume back. Guillaume got annoyed if Enjolras ignored him for too long – and Enjolras had been ignoring Guillaume for a very, very long time now.

-

Grantaire's apartment was dark. It wasn't just the normal sort of dark when there was only the light of the city slipping between his wonky blinds as they fell asleep together in Grantaire's bed after a companionable evening of bad TV and booze, but the sort of dark that felt heavy with bad days and the sort of alcohol that didn't bring laughter but instead tried to blur the harsh edges. She and Grantaire had both had days like that. Right now it was Grantaire's turn. He was exhausted, miserable, and Éponine knew that somehow it was that Enjolras' fault. Hell, she'd known Enjolras was bad news since the first time Grantaire had come home with hearts in his eyes from that uppity boy club that Joly and Bossuet had dragged him to. She didn't know what was up with Grantaire and his soulmate – he kept it the fuck to himself and Éponine wasn't about to pry, that shit was fucked up and personal – but she was also damn sure it wasn't Enjolras. It had only taken a cracked open bottle of vodka to get him sobbing about this beautiful, shining, unachievable man. Things had been normal for a while after that, with Grantaire becoming occasionally despondent when he thought too much about Enjolras, but lately it had been getting worse, ever since Enjolras had found his soulmate. Éponine had mostly expected that the day this happened would be a bad one for Grantaire and she had been ready to ride that wave out with him, but things had... changed. She didn't really know this intrepid leader of theirs that well, but from the stories Grantaire had been feeding her, from the late night texting sessions she'd caught him in, she knew that _something_ was happening. Something bad. He spent most of his time around Enjolras now, and when he came back he looked like someone had dropped the weight of the world on his back, as if Grantaire needed anymore of that shit.

It had been like that tonight, when she had arrived at Grantaire's apartment with a bottle of booze. Tonight also carried marks up her thighs from hers and Montparnasse's last foray into pretending neither cared about their mysterious, absent soulmates, and marks up her heart from seeing Marius out with that Courfeyrac kid, shopping for new _coats_ of all things. Like a gross, clingy couple. It was disgusting. But rather than get a chance to wallow about her own pathetic love life, she'd found Grantaire already several beers down and slumped on the couch.

“I'll kill him,” was the last thing Grantaire had mumbled before falling asleep in her lap. Éponine wasn't entire sure who “he” was at this point, but she was inclined to suspect this Guillaume guy. Except it had become clear a long time ago that Grantaire's hatred wasn't just for the soulmate that had stolen away the love of his life and that he genuinely believed something sinister about this Guillaume person. Honestly, it only surprised her in the vague, distant way that you expected perfect people like Enjolras to end up with perfect people, like a damn Disney movie. Angels with angels and demons with demons – or demons left alone to bear their sins in lonely penance, more often than not. Still, it was a vague, jaded sort of surprise.

“Yeah, well, my parents are soulmates,” was all she had said when Grantaire had hedged around the fact that Guillaume had _done_ something.

_And they are hardly the only people to suck at being soulmates, Guillaume wouldn't be the first person to ruin his soulmate's life,_ she didn't say because what came to mind wasn't her parents and their mutually assured destruction, but another girl and what having soulmates for parents had done to her. She didn't say anything though because that wasn't her fucking business anymore, hadn't been in years, probably never had been at all if it hadn't for her parents and their temporary foster scheme.

The point was, soulmates were people. And maybe the universe had some fucked up idea about how people were meant to go together, or maybe it was people with those fucked up ideas and they just tried to make some force of nature fit that idea, but the point was she wasn't actually surprised to hear that there was something wrong about whatever was happening between Enjolras and his soulmate. Considering how damn cynical Grantaire could be, she was surprised he was.

It was with those thoughts in her mind and a bottle neck in her hand that her phone went off, screen buzzing to life and casting harsh light on the dark room.

Well, she'd be damned. Of all the people to text her now.

-

_Enjolras and Guillaume were having a fight._

_Or something._

_Combeferre wasn't entirely sure. He was uneducated on the matter and not in a position to make opinions. There was no reason at all for Combeferre to take sides._

_Except Combeferre still couldn't look Guillaume in the face without wanting to punch him until he admitted what he had done to Enjolras._

“ _If it's just that you don't feel like working with young kids,” Guillaume persisted, “then we were also planning on putting together an area for older teenagers that could use studying help or university tips; you'd be great at that and we could really use some more volunteers.”_

_No reason to take sides, except Enjolras wouldn't tell Combeferre what had happened and Combeferre genuinely couldn't recall a single time he or Enjolras had ever felt the need to keep a secret from one another._

_No reason to take sides, except when Combeferre had finally gone to visit Enjolras in his and Courfeyrac's apartment after too long apart it had taken almost half an hour before Enjolras had started to ease into their conversation. No reason to take sides, except when he had asked about Enjolras' health, about what had happened, Enjolras' answers had been cagey and anxious – Enjolras had always been a bad liar, but in this case Combeferre couldn't figure out what he was lying about. So Enjolras had simply sat and fidgeted until finally at some point after they'd finished their coffee, when Courfeyrac had come to join them, his shoulders had finally relaxed and he stopped glancing around like he was expecting someone to get angry at him._

_No reason to take sides except something had happened to Enjolras and so far only six people had any idea what that was: Enjolras himself, Courfeyrac, Marius, Grantaire, possibly Bahorel, and Guillaume. And while Guillaume acted as uncertain as the rest of them, Enjolras was currently all out avoiding Guillaume, while Courfeyrac, Grantaire and Bahorel had collectively become hostile to him. Somehow,_ somehow _Guillaume was the epicentre of whatever had happened to Combeferre's best friend._

“ _Sorry.” Combeferre's response was curt and he was already turning away from Guillaume again. “I'm busy.”_

_They had just had a fight, Combeferre tried to tell himself. A normal couple's fight, or something._

_But the “or something” rang in his mind like a church bell, loud and distant and hearkening all to listen._

-

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dang i was hoping to get all these uploaded before my program started but i didn't quite make it... so that's where i've been that past couple weeks, getting chewed up and spat out by school =^=. i'm just gonna drop the last few chapters and be done with it before i get caught back up in course work, so enjoy  
> (also thank you everyone that commented on the last chapter, I didn't get a chance to respond to them all and it feels too late now to go back and do it, but I really appreciated them all! You're all so lovely <3)

Éponine stared at the screen, at the name attached to the text, and wondered if she should answer at all. Mostly they pretended the other didn't exist because... well, after everything, it was easier that way. Most of the time Éponine didn't know whether to feel like she was choking on jealousy or guilt and she was tired of feeling like she had fucked up not only her own life but someone else's too.

Still, it had been a fucked up few weeks so what was one more fuck up to add to the pile?

 _Why the fuck would you ask me?_ she typed back.

It took no time for the reply: _You've always seemed to know everyone, Ep._ Flatterer. Nice try, wouldn't work though. Éponine didn't have an ounce of vanity to play into – she knew people because sometimes that was what saved your ass when you were a teenager half-living on the streets with siblings to watch out for and a family to keep fed.

The texting continued: _No pressure! Obviously I know you probably don't know him, I just thought I should try_

 _So who is the mystery man?_ Éponine typed back. _Finally found your soulmate?_ When she did, he would be perfect, Éponine knew that. Someone sweet, kind, someone who adored her. Éponine didn't buy into the whole “perfect soulmate” bullshit like some people did, but that didn't mean she didn't like to think it – and if anyone found _the_ perfect soulmate it would be _her_.

 _Don't joke about that,_ was the reply Éponine got, and she could nearly hear the harsh, scared tone. Considering she had gotten everything anyone could ever want, considering she was living the dream, it was easy to forget sometimes that she shied away from the belief of a perfect soulmate as harshly and bitterly as Éponine did. Perhaps more so.

_No, it's just... there was a boy. And I think he needs help. My papa met him but I think he got scared off. He's about our age, with blonde hair, looks well-off. I think he said his name was something like Angelas? I don't know, it was a weird name. Have you heard anything about him? I just... feel like I need to do something, maybe I can help?_

Éponine stared contemplatively at the phone. What were the odds? Eponine had expected to tell her to fuck off, that she didn't know every person in the damn city, never mind the country. Instead... well, it was a small world, sometimes.

But she only responded because if there was any chance of giving Grantaire a break, she'd take it, the asshole had earned it. Besides, if he was wrapped up in this particular shit show, maybe Enjolras really did need help.

Éponine typed back, _Actually, I do. I'll see if I can figure out where you can find him._

-

The texting continued. It was getting easier for Enjolras to see Guillaume's name appear on his phone without feeling like he was going to have another panic attack. That was like recovery, right?

 _Wrong_. Though it was his own mind thinking it, it sounded like Grantaire's voice.

But he just... didn't know how to stop. Surely it should be easy. Surely it should be easy to run away from pain and awful things and fix it. Surely, if it was really a bad thing, he wouldn't feel himself continuously getting drawn back in. Maybe this was simply where he belonged.

He didn't really no where else to turn. Courfeyrac and Marius, in soulmated bliss? Combeferre, who he was still keeping out of the worst of it? He honestly didn't know what he would do if his best friend had to see him differently as well, couldn't he be allowed one slice or normalcy in his life? And he and Combeferre were finally hanging out again, it was... nice.

Normally he turned to Grantaire. The rock, the irreverent, the only other person as stolidly against soulmates as Enjolras' heart had become lately. Lately it felt weird. Guilty. Like Enjolras had done exactly what Guillaume had continuously accused him of, that he had ignored Grantaire's feelings completely and only saw the feelings he wanted to see. Despite this, he resolutely acted like he normally did around Grantaire – he had, Enjolras realized, become one of his best friends. Once you got used to the way Grantaire thought and spoke and acted, when you got used to the bigness of it all, the theatrics, the fact that you couldn't take everything he said at face-value or you would miss so much of what he was actually saying, Enjolras finally understood what Joly and Bossuet had seen in him. He understood what Courfeyrac and Marius and Bahorel all saw in him now. And he bitterly wished it hadn't taken him so long – how was it fair that he could fall heads over heels in love with someone terrible with no effort, but it had taken months to realize the inherent goodness in someone that cared about it.

Enjolras sighed. He was terrible with people.

“You good?” asked Grantaire, who'd be lounging in the chair across from the couch, video game in hand.

Flustered, Enjolras assured him it was, and frantically tried to drag his thoughts away from Grantaire and back to the open text book in front of him – he still had so much catching up to to do.

There was a moment's pause, and then suddenly the background noise of the little portable game that had been filling the apartment with a happy, quiet chirping, cut out.

“Hey, Enjolras, wait. I feel like I should explain things better than I did last time,” said Grantaire. “I know I was... a little abrupt. I don't know. I just didn't really expect suddenly be thinking about that again and it just, it threw me off.”

“Explain what?”

“About my... you know, about my soulmate.”

Enjolras could feel himself getting flushed. He didn't want to talk about this. He didn't want to think about Grantaire being separated from his soulmate only by a tragic twist of fate, he didn't want to think about Grantaire, his cynic, being happy with a soulmate while he was how he was, he didn't want to think about Grantaire being happy _with someone else_. ...And he also really didn't want to have to think about how terrible and petty it was to think such a thing.

Grantaire was obviously to wrapped up in his own thoughts though, because he didn't notice any of these expression twist across Enjolras' face; Grantaire was staring down at his hands.

“I don't like talking about her,” he admitted.

“Of course, I under–”

“No. Not like that. It's not... that's the problem. I'm not... I'm not upset that she's gone.” He gave a short, bitter laugh. “Isn't that awful?”

Enjolras didn't know what to say. He didn't even know what to think, the statement had been so unexpected. He was aware that he was simply standing there, staring at Grantaire.

Grantaire peaked up at him, and then sighed. “We'd better sit down.”

Once they were seated, Grantaire continued to speak, head lowered and voice lower still. “Look, it's not that I'm not upset that she died. I am. I would never... she didn't deserve that. She was wonderful, and so alive, and I hate that... that it all happened like this. But I'm not upset that she's not my soulmate any longer. Does that... does that make sense?”

“I think so,” said Enjolras. He wondered if he could even imagine a world where Guillaume didn't exist in it any longer. “What... was she... was she like...?”

“Oh, god, no. Nothing like that. Fuck, no. Nothing like...” _You,_ went unsaid.

Scrubbing a hand down his face, Grantaire looked dutifully anywhere but Enjolras, radiating discomfort. Enjolras was about to say something to diffuse the situation, to steer them back into safer waters, when Grantaire spoke again.

“Look, I don't really... I don't talk about this. At all. But it's not... look, it's not whatever you're thinking. It's not about her being dead, and it's not like she... she hurt me, or anything. Ha, like you said, I kickbox, and she was tiny. It was... well, it's always me, that fucks this sort of stuff up, I just wasn't made for this soulmate thing. I think maybe a lot of people weren't.”

Maybe it made him a bad person, but Enjolras was _curious_. Grantaire talked at length, endlessly, often to no purpose but did so in such a way that you forgot that there wasn't a purpose to it all. He was, Enjolras had been learning, a storyteller. And now Enjolras was once again fascinated by the promise of a story, though he had to remind himself that this wasn't a tale of women gifted with a curse, or the man who nobly slayed her, but Grantaire's actual life, something he had just said he didn't like to talk about. Still, Enjolras had to ask. “What happened?”

Grantaire's gaze stayed away, locked on his hand which was needing his thigh hidden beneath blue jeans.

“She just... died. It wasn't really anything that spectacular. It was really fucking normal, all things considered. A car accident. Not even involving a drunk driver, so it wasn't like... divine retribution teaching me to change my wicked drunken ways or anything. It had been late at night, she'd been travelling with her family, and some trucker had fallen asleep at the wheel just long enough to knock their car off the road. She'd been sleeping in the back seat, her seatbelt had been twisted under her, and I guess it hit her wrong or something. She died. Rest of her family was mostly okay. When I found out I just... I dunno, I just shutdown. For like a month, at least. Only reason I didn't flunk my classes was because it was my soulmate and I was given a mandated grievance period.”

“You loved her,” said Enjolras, trying to make sure he didn't sound as betrayed as he felt. It was stupid, it _was_ , but he had thought... Instead of focussing on that, he placed a hand over the one Grantaire had resting on his thigh and squeezed. “I'm sorry.”

 _Look at you,_ said a soft voice in his head. _Grantaire was in love. He had a soulmate, had a chance at the bright, shiny, promised future everyone strove for, and he lost it. You have it and you're squandering it._ God, Grantaire must hate him. How could he stand to listen to Enjolras spit on what Grantaire would never get to have again? How could–?

“Yeah, I loved her,” Grantaire said, cutting across Enjolras thoughts. “I loved her so fucking much. I _worshipped_ her.” His voice broke there.

Something wet hit the back of Enjolras' hand and he was startled to realize Grantaire was _crying_. Not having the slightest idea what else to do, Enjolras did the only thing that made sense: he turned fully and wrapped his arms around Grantaire, pulling him close. Grantaire went easily, crumbling like torn paper, or a cracked cup, pressing himself full against Enjolras. His tears were silent, but Enjolras waited them out, just like Grantaire had done for him too many times by this point.

“It's not,” he said, “it's not that I _wanted_ her to die. Or that I'm _happy_ she's dead. But Enjolras. I... God, I _worshipped_ her. She was perfect. She was so kind, and warm. She had an amazing laugh. Her sleep schedule was as fucked up as mine and we use to sit up all night watching, like, movies from the eighties and stupid shit. But... I don't know. I don't understand it. I don't understand _this_. This soulmate thing. Does anyone? Everyone pretends they do, and they make all these pretty, perfect movies, and tell everyone that they are going to have this pretty, perfect life once they find their soulmates but... what if 'perfect' for each other isn't the same sort of perfect that Disney thinks it is?”

“How do you mean?”

Grantaire shrugged. “People always just... they think of soulmates like these two pieces that fit perfectly together, right? But for that to work, one piece always has to have a part cut out of it so that the other piece fits, right? What if soulmates are like that? No, not all of them. I don't know. Like Bossuet and Joly and Musichetta – _they're_ what soulmates are meant to be. Or Courf and Marius. They just... work. They're perfect, I guess. They fit together without anyone losing any part of themselves, they just... bring each other together. Make each other better. And I guess I fit with my soulmate. I did. I don't... I _didn't_ like who I was. It was easier to like other people, easier to _be_ other people. So I just sort of... made myself out of her. She was everything to me. She's was a good person, she _was,_ but, well, she _liked_ to be worshipped. So I guess we actually fit together pretty well.”

Grantaire leaned back. He still wasn't looking at Enjolras, but now it didn't seem so much like he was trying to avoid it, but rather that he was seeing something else, a long time ago.

“I loved her with everything I had. I loved her until, looking back, I'm not sure how much of me was left. When she died I was destroyed. But then the world kept turning, and life kept going, and I just... kept going with it. And then one day, I was able to go the whole day without thinking about her. Then weeks would past. I made new friends – I didn't meet Bossuet and Joly until after her. I... found me again. And then I started thinking back about it. I wonder just what would have happened to me if she had stayed. Would I be me? Would I be the person I am right now? Or would I be her? Or not really her, but a shadow of her. We fit each other perfectly, but that perfection required me being less. I don't know if I could do that anymore. Sometimes it's still so easy to see someone bright and beautiful and just want to bask. To follow their lead and trust they know what they're doing.” For the first time in minutes, Grantaire looked at him, peeked a glance out of the corner of his eye in a way Enjolras couldn't quite interpret the meaning of, then he was looking away again. “But... well, they're not my soulmate. I don't have to be with them. Even if I do follow, I can stop. If my soulmate were to somehow walk up to me now... I don't know if we _would_ fit anymore. I don't know if I'd want to.

“So, yeah. That's my deep, dark secret, I guess. I had a soulmate, and she died, and I'm glad I'm by myself. Maybe it's selfish and fucked up and maybe I'm always going to be miserable and alone because of it but that's just how it is.”

Enjolras didn't know what to say to that.

 


	12. Chapter 12

Enjolras was leaning against the wall of a small, second-hand book store, twisting his phone back and forth in his hands as he felt something thick and heavy and nauseating twist in his stomach. To say he was having thoughts would be an understatement.

The clock on his phone ticked silently over from 12:22 to 12:23. Enjolras contemplated briefly about going back into the book store and seeing if he could use their washroom so he could go throw up somewhere private. Instead he shoved his phone back in his pocket, tried to breath deep and slow like Grantaire had been showing him, and leaned his head back against the store's brick wall. The brick's grit dug into his head but Enjolras relished it silently as something real and grounding, anything that wasn't the heart-stopping terror of what could be and what had been.

He was going to meet Guillaume at a small cafe just down the street from here at twelve-thirty.

He was going to see Guillaume again. Sitting in that bus in the dark, with lights streaming by and Fantine a fantasy and Guillaume as the only reality left, he had made plans to see him again. It had seemed... inevitable. Like a vacation coming to an end, or a beautiful, delicate soap bubble popping – a beautiful, delicate web of paper inevitably tearing under big, clumsy, awful hands. For a while Enjolras had been able to hide but he'd known that time was limitted. He couldn't stay in Courfeyrac's apartment forever – even just going back to school would mean running into Guillaume; it _had_ meant running into Guillaume. He couldn't keep pretending this didn't exist. Agreeing to face Guillaume now, it was squaring up his shoulders and taking control of the situation, right? Maybe now, maybe now that they've had a break, they could talk. Things could change. He had changed, hadn't he?

(No, he was still dragging down his friends, relying on them until they were choked under his presence, making problems, making noise, complaining, fussing – he'd tried to harass some poor lady just so that he could have someone validate him, because he needed that much attention on himself.)

But it wasn't just that was it?

_And he missed Guillaume._

Enjolras tried to shove it down, to ignore it, to insist it couldn't exist. Not when Courfeyrac had to help him through breakdowns and Grantaire taken time out of his life just to sit beside Enjolras while he refused to talk, after all that it would be _wrong_ to miss him. Enjolras had done this, he was the one who had run, who had set Guillaume's own friends against him, it wasn't fair for him to miss Guillaume, was it? But when he was alone in the apartment he remembered living with his soulmate, and when he read a book he knew Guillaume would like he fantasized about watching Guillaume read it, and when he and Grantaire butted heads he thought about how in sync his and Guillaume's beliefs were. When he looked at the future and realized that if he stayed like this nothing would ever change, he would be alone forever – and not just like this, but even more alone, when his friends graduated school and moved on, when Courfeyrac finally kicked him out for good to move into a real house with Marius and live happily ever after, then he would be so, strikingly, horrifying alone.

But that could change. With Guillaume. _Soulmates: proof that humanity was always meant to work together in harmony, proof that humans were social creatures who were meant to share their hearts with others._ Enjolras could claim this was about control but he knew, he _knew_ he was afraid. He was constantly, heart-wrenching afraid and he needed Guillaume. Guillaume knew he was a terrible person but still loved him. He was his soulmate and would stay with him.

So Enjolras swallowed his fear because this entire situation was his own making and leaned back against the brick wall, watching the time tick down to twelve-thirty. He could, of course, stroll up to the cafe now, get a seat, order what he knew to be Guillaume's favourite coffee, and wait for him but instead he lingered on the pavement, waiting until the last moment to go.

12:28

It would take at least a couple minutes to get to the end of the street, if he wanted to be on time he had to leave now. ( _Hand clenched around his arm so hard it burned, felt like the skin would be torn right off; “Where were you, Enjolras, why are you always wandering around like some slut, dinner was ready ages ago” I'm sorry I'm sorry I won't be late I was at the library Guillaume I'm sorry–_ )

He had only pushed himself off the wall and taken a couple steps though when, like a wraith rising from the darkest depths of his nightmares, a hand clamped down around his arm.

-

[someone else's scene]

-

The hand clamped down on his arm and as if that simple gesture had wrung out every ounce of strength he had in his body he felt himself go limp under it. Rather than turning and running like his spiked heart rate wanted or spinning to face his attacker, he stood stock still, shoulders slumping and eyes staring out, waiting, just waiting, it was easier to stay still _to stop fighting to let it happen_ –

Then the hand was gone, and it took a moment for him to be able to hear anything over the sound of his own breathing, or to realize that someone had slowly moved in front of him and was speaking.

“I am so sorry, I should have realized – that was inexcusable, I'm sorry, it's okay, everything's going to be okay–”

Embarrassment replacing fear, Enjolras fought to compose himself, to try to make it seem like he'd never lost it in the first place; he took a hard step back from the person, the girl, speaking to him, tugging at his clothes as if straightening them could put his life in order as well.

“What do you want?” he demanded, his voice coming out harsher than he'd intended – _I'm going to be late to meet Guillaume,_ that little voice in his head was whispering, _and he is going to be so mad._

The girl floundered for a moment before finally meekly saying, “My name's Cosette. I was wondering, are you Enjolras?”

“I– yes? Do I know you?”

“Not really. But you met my mom! And I am sorry if... if this isn't my business at all and I'm getting in your face, and I'm _really_ sorry for scaring you–” Enjolras cringed and made a half-hearted attempt to deny it but Cosette was still talking. “–but I thought... I thought maybe if I could find you maybe I could talk to you, and Éponine said she knew you and that you were going to be around here this afternoon, and since I was going to come out to the city for some shopping anyways it seemed like as good a time as any...”

“Éponine?” Enjolras asked. “Grantaire's friend?”

He didn't know much about Éponine personally, he had only seen her a few times when she'd been hanging around with Grantaire or Marius or occasionally Joly, Bossuet, and Musichetta. She'd seemed abrasive and disinterested in anything he'd had to say and he remembered at the time thinking bitterly that it was no wonder she was Grantaire's friend – at least Grantaire pretended to enjoy spending time with him though. Spending time with Grantaire lately he had heard more about this Éponine though and the mishaps she and Grantaire had gotten into, and he found himself rather illogical willing to trust someone that Grantaire seemed to trust by extension. Which made no sense because he couldn't even trust someone who had been specifically created to fit by his side – no, that was the wrong train of thought to follow, focus on Cosette, she was talking.

“Yeah, that's her. I don't know if she ever mentioned me– we... go back. But that's not important. I was actually wondering if you'd like to sit down and talk at all? Sorry, this is going to be really awkward but if I hadn't at least tried to find you– I'm going to stop rambling. There was a little pastry shop just a couple shops down, would you like to sit down?”

He should tell her no. He should tell her that he already had plans with someone and that he was already late for them. He didn't know a thing about this girl, why should he wander off with her, but before he could protest he already found himself following quickly after her. There was no point trying to deny the tight knot of stress in his chest and how in that moment it thawed into a sweet, warm relief.

 


	13. Chapter 13

He winds up in a little pastry shop that he'd never even really noticed before. He preferred the coffee shop where he was going to meet Guillaume, it was where he always went when he was in this part of town, he and Guillaume had spent so many hours there. (So had he and Combeferre, he and Courfeyrac, he and Jehan and Feuilly and Bahorel and Joly and Bossuet. He'd even gone there once with Marius when he was helping Marius and Courfeyrac find books in the used book store for class. So why did Guillaume permeate it? Why did the thought of that coffee shop;s leather couches and dark, bitter smell make him like he was being surrounded by some shrouded threat rather than friends?)

(Guillaume was waiting there. He wanted to go there and feel safe. He wanted to see his soulmate again for the first time in too long and hug him and drink coffee and feel like he did the first time he'd ever taken Guillaume there on a date, the first time he'd opened a special place of his to Guillaume.)

(Instead he was sitting in a pastry shop that smelt like donuts and sugar. He'd never been there before, but he sat in it, on a different street, with a complete stranger, and felt...)

(Not safe. He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt safe, not when Guillaume was down the street and _waiting_ for him, but he felt... better. Less sick.)

They sat in slightly uncomfortable silence until their tea came; something fruity that Enjolras had never heard of, but he had taken one look at the coffee selection and had promptly closed the menu and went with whatever Cosette chose. It included some cherry pastry covered with so much coconut and icing that Enjolras wasn't even sure if he'd be able to stomach it. Still, he and Cosette both poured themselves a cup, not bothering to wait for it to steep properly – maybe Cosette liked hers weak, or maybe she, like Enjolras, desperately needed something to do with her hands. It wasn't until the little tea spoons were clinking against the sides of the cups that Enjolras couldn't take it any longer.

“You said I've met your mom,” he said. “You also said you needed to talk to me about something. If this is related to Les Amis de l'ABC, then... then you should probably talk to Combeferre instead.” It caught in his throat a little. He hadn't been to a meeting in... ages. And if anyone, even Courf or Grantaire, had suggested he go to one this morning he'd have curled up under his covers and pretended not to hear them, but all of a sudden he found there was nothing he would rather be doing...

“No, actually... and if you don't want to talk about this, or anything, then we don't have to but... um, my mom is Fantine Fauchelevent.”

Enjolras nearly dropped his spoon, spilling sugar across the table.

_His mind stopped. His heart raced. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't stop breathing. Fantine. Fantine's daughter. Fantine was real._

He didn't know what he wanted to do.

Didn't know what he could do.

What if she told him, for once and for all, removing all doubt, that Fantine was happily married to her soulmate and it had all been a big mistake?

_What if she told him she wasn't._

“You actually probably saw more of my papa,” Cosette continued, smiling sheepishly, a carefully invitation to share a joke, to smile, to be light. Enjolras couldn't. So that was it. This was the pretty woman he'd met at the house, he hadn't gotten the wrong place. And that had been her soulmate.

“Oh, no, please don't cry. He's not as scary as he looks, I swear,” Cosette said, and it was only because of that that Enjolras even realized his eyes were burning, that his cheeks were sticky.

He distantly watched Cosette's hands fluttered like butterflies around where his were clenched against the table. Not touching him but wanting to. It made him think of Grantaire, of Courfeyrac, of them approaching him only when they knew he was looking, of being slow and careful before touching him (he thought of the number of the time he'd punched Grantaire because he'd been startled or the time he'd kicked Marius and gave him a bloody nose because he'd fallen asleep on the couch and Marius had sat by his feet and jostled him and he'd thought – no.) A strange, angry part of him just wanted her to _touch_. Just grab his hand. Why shouldn't she, what did it matter, just _do_ it. If she wanted to, just _do_ it. But she didn't. Just looked like _she_ was about to cry instead and waited, patiently, for him.

What was the point of her coming here? To tell him that he was disgusting and making a mistake like her mother had? Or was it really just to apologize for the fact that her father had chased off the miserable little creature on their doorstep?

Instead of saying any of that, Cosette just kept talking in her small, soft voice. “My mother doesn't really like to talk about... _that_ , so when you came to the door asking for Him, she just. She couldn't. You understand, right? It was... you know, it wasn't a good time for her, and she lives with it enough without having it brought up. And my papa's very protective of her, so when he saw her come back from the door looking like she was going to cry he thought some reporter was harassing her again after all these years. She... she was upset, afterwards. When she realized what it was about, that it wasn't... that it wasn't about Him. She went back to the door to look for you, we walked up and down the street, but you'd run off. I couldn't stop thinking about it though. About her and... and about you, whoever you were; I only heard about it when I got back from school. It was just luck really that Éponine knew who you were.”

Enjolras felt like he wasn't understanding. Like he couldn't. Like there was no way the little flicker of hope in his chest at this girl's words could possibly be right. So under her concerned eyes he steadied his breath, scrubbed his hand across his eyes, and asked the question that needed to be asked. Just get it over with, he just had to _know_.

“That... that man at the door. That was... was it... her soulmate?”

The noise Cosette made, ugly and vicious, was so at odds with every other delicate thing about her that it made Enjolras jump.

“ _No_ ,” she said vehemently.

No. That man living with Fantine, who Cosette – the once young daughter the newspapers had mentioned, surely – called _papa_ was not Fantine's soulmate, was not the man called Félix. Enjolras felt dangerously close to crying again.

“Absolutely _not_. Papa – he met my mother while she was struggling with... everything. _Him_. The legal system. Getting me back. All of it. He helped her, paid her legal expenses, gave her somewhere safe to stay. And after everything, he helped her get custody of me again. He's...” Her jaw was clenched, hard, as she struggled for words. “He is the greatest, kindest, most wonderful, compassionate man I've ever met. So no, he's _not_ her soulmate.” She then flashed him a warning look, one that looked more like habit than anything personal, as she spit, “But they love each other, and they're better for each other than some soulmates I've met, and he is _absolutely_ my papa.”

Cosette looked him squarely in the eye there, and Enjolras wasn't sure if she looked like she was about to cry herself or try to fight him. Enjolras was too busy trying to remember how to breathe to be overly concerned about it.

Fantine was living with someone who wasn't her soulmate. They loved each other. They weren't alone, and they had a daughter together.

How.

How, how could that be allowed? How could that happen? That wasn't how things were supposed to go, you weren't supposed to have a happy life and love and a child if you weren't with your soulmate. You waited until you met your soulmate for that.

“What...” Enjolras paused and took a sip of his tea. It was still too hot but it helped him feel more human, more grounded. He was in a cafe, with another human being, talking. He wasn't in his head, or in the coffee shop down the street. “I'm sorry if this is rude to ask, I just... What happened to her soulmate?”

Cosette took a moment to answer. “He's gone. He left a long time ago. I never met him, I don't even know his name, Mama never told me. Papa... told me a little. During all the legal stuff, I guess it was getting really public. There was a lot of controversy. People mostly sided with my mom's soulmate, they thought she was... was _sick_ for not wanting him, for having her own feelings. If things had carried on... I don't know, things probably would have worked out in his favour. I don't know. _I don't know_. But he didn't like the scrutiny I guess, didn't want to get drawn so far into it, and he decided if Mama was going to act this way he wouldn't take her back. Which was obviously the best thing mama could have ever asked for. So he's... gone, I guess. Doing something with his life, I don't know. I don't want to.”

A gentle hand then pressed itself over one of the ones Enjolras had wrapped around his cup, making him start.

“Is your soulmate... not good?” Cosette asked softly. “I know Papa seems intimidating, but if you need help he would help you. I would help you.”

“I...” Enjolras didn't know what to say. Not to a stranger. Because he wanted to say _no, he's his_ soulmate _, he's fine, he's perfect. He has to be_. He didn't want to make this more real. But it had been weeks now and there was no denying it any longer. It was one thing to hide in an apartment and pretend the rest of the world didn't exist, but sitting in a sunny cafe, with a warm tea under his hands, and a person's hand resting against his, his school bag pressed against his knee... that was real. And that meant that somewhere out there was Guillaume, and he was real, and that all of this _was real_.

The part of him that felt that, the felt the school bag on his knee, too-full of the work he had missed, that felt the press of Guillaume at his back, that felt the gurgle in his stomach because it had been so long since he'd left the house to eat food as sweet and rich as this, that part of him desperately wanted to tell this kind stranger _yes_. Yes he is bad, yes I need help, yes I want to get away from him, _yes yes yes–_

Yes, I was raped.

He wanted to say it. Wanted to believe it. But the words caught nauseatingly and he wasn't sure he could. Sometimes it was so obvious it felt like it sat on his chest and crushed everything else out of him, every breath, ever other thought, every other feeling. Other days it didn't feel real. Was Guillaume really that bad? Was what happened to him really... really...?

“It's alright,” said Cosette. “It's hard for Mama to talk about too. You don't have to say anything. That isn't wrong.”

Then, to Enjolras' horror, the nausea twisted and snagged in his throat and he felt the unsettling, familiar sensation of tears burning in his eyes just before a hiccuping sob escaped his mouth. Again. He was crying again. Would it never stop? Cosette's hand disappeared from his then and he was able to curl in on himself, try to hide himself away and let the tears run down his cheeks into his tea, but then there was the scrape of a chair being pulled near him and Cosette's arm appeared tentatively over his shoulder.

“Let me know if I should stop,” she said, it it was just such a _relief_ to feel something warm and heavy that grounded him and reminded him he wasn't alone that Enjolras could just shake his head and wait the tears out.

Cosette didn't rush him and she didn't leave, even though she was a stranger.

Perhaps the trip wasn't a waste after all.

-

Eventually the tears eased. He knew the people still in the cafe must be staring, he had heard one lady come over and ask Cosette if he was okay, but Cosette had simply told her everything would be fine, and to please leave them. Polite but firm. The sort of girl who had grown up used to defining boundaries to people that wanted to let their curiosity or judgement tramp past them.

“What do you need?” Cosette asked. Not if he needed something, but what. And he truly believed she would give it to him. He should feel ashamed, sitting in front of a stranger like this, but Enjolras had never had a problem with strangers, had never felt the unease around people he didn't know like some people did. At one point, it had let him deliver pamphlets and lectures and speeches with ease. Now apparently it meant he felt no more wretched about crying that he normally did. How diverse his skillset. He should also feel bad about accepting her help, of inconveniencing her like he was his friends but something stopped him short.

Maybe it was the realization that every so often buzzed at the back of his head, the one that said that voice telling him to be ashamed sounded a lot like Guillaume.

Maybe it was because this girl knew what it meant to help someone bear a weight like this and wasn't daunted, wasn't being forced into it blind like Courfeyrac and Grantaire or any of their other friends, and yet still offered the help.

Maybe he was just too tired to fight right now; likely his mood would flop before the day was over, but for right now it was a relief.

_What did Enjolras want?_

His phone chimed in his pocket. Enjolras knew without looking that the text would be from Guillaume. If he left right now maybe Guillaume would excuse how late he was. Maybe he'd already be sitting there, with a coffee and cookie for Enjolras and be so grateful to see him he didn't even think to be angry. He almost said as much to Cosette.

 _But is that what I want?_ How often had Guillaume ever asked that? At one point it had felt charming, like his soulmate knew him so well that he needn't ask, but the charm had faded and left something ugly and hollow in its wake, something Cosette – something his friends – all in their own ways offered to help him fill.

The phone chimed again. Enjolras reached into his pocket and turned it off.

“Could we just... talk?” he asked. “I don't know what I can – what I can say, but if we... if it's alright...”

Cosette's hand gave a comforting squeeze before letting go of him to refill her tea cup. Neither of them would be going anywhere soon.

 


	14. Chapter 14

“I think one of the best things you could do is just... decide what you want,” Cosette had said after Enjolras had said more than he'd ever expected to. “Not everything, you shouldn't feel like you need to know everything but just... something. Make one choice and stick with it. You deserve to make your own choices.”

“I don't want to see Guillaume. Ever again. And I'm tired to thinking that I do, over and over. It's like a sickness.”

“I don't think it's like a sickness I just think... it's what we're supposed to think, isn't it? That we can never be happy without our soulmates? Mama and Papa don't really talk about it but I think... I think it took them both a long time to realize they were allowed to be happy together. That it was okay.”

“And does she ever... miss...?”

“No. But I don't know what it was like before. Like I said, I was with a foster family for a long time – the courts didn't think my mother was a suitable parent.” The bitter note was almost surprising to hear in Cosette's voice, everything about her was... soft, sweet, accommodating. “All because she was forced to share words with a monster. Maybe she did miss him during that time. Maybe she regretted what she was doing. I know she doesn't now.”

“We can't be the only people,” Enjolras said. He knew he sounded desperate but he couldn't help it. “Why would they keep pushing this idea if obviously that's not how it works for everyone? Why would they do this to people? Why would they take away that choice?” _Why did they make me feel like it was okay for him to force me to the ground and hurt me? Why did they make it feel like me saying no was a bigger crime then him forcing a yes?_ Though Enjolras couldn't bring himself to speak the words, the thought of them stung his throat like acid.

“I don't know.” It was almost a relief to hear that Cosette sounded just as bitter as he did – bitter and weary. “I hate it though. I... Can I tell you a secret? You've been telling me so much, it only seems fair but I... I'm really, really scared to meet my soulmate. I know I have one, I have the words, but what happens if I meet them and it's awful? And even after everything Mama's done I'm still scared. She's so brave and I'm not even sure I can say no if they cross my path. Or what if my soulmate is a good person and I refuse them just because I'm scared? I hate it. I hate this. I wish it was a secret, with no words and no fate and no... anything. Then no one would know their soulmate and everyone would just... fall in love with good people. Wouldn't it be better that way, to just get to fall in love and have whoever you choose be the right person?”

Enjolras' throat felt tight. Dry. “Have you... ever been in love with someone who wasn't your soulmate?”

Cosette shook her head. Enjolras took a steady breath and asked the next question, one that had been plaguing him more and more lately.

“Do you know how to tell if you are?”

Cosette hesitated. She thought about it. She answered, slowly and carefully. “When I think about my mama and papa, I think... I think it's about trying. They always treat soulmates like something that just happens, but I don't... I don't think love just _happens_. Not completely. I think you need to take care of it, like... like a garden? It's about having someone and wanting them to be happy and safe and health... but it's also about knowing that the other person wants it too? You can't just give. You can't let someone just... take every little bit of you, like the own it, because if it was love then they shouldn't _want_ to. If you're in love, then it just seems like it must be... about wanting to be with that person, always, when it's good and bad, and wanting to just... do normal things with them. Romantic stuff too, maybe, but also just... eat cereal and go on walks and talking. Not because you have to, but because it makes you happy. Because they make you feel good and you make them feel good. And I just... I really think that that can come from places besides soulmates. I love my parents, and they... they do all of that for me. They never make me give myself up, they just... add to me? I guess. They make me happy. And I want to make them happy. I hope when, if, I fall in love, it's like that. I want it to be warm, and I want it to be my choice, every day to love that person, and I want to know that I'm their choice too.”

For a long moment, they sat in silence as Enjolras digested these words.

Guillaume took from him. Maybe there had been good moments, but did that make up for the fact that he had been willing to take so much of Enjolras that he had been left feeling hollow and empty? Did it make up for the fact that he hadn't cared how broken he had left Enjolras?

Enjolras had tried to love Guillaume, to make him happy, to give, and maybe in another world they would have been good together. They were both resolute and confident, they could have bounced off each other's energy and convictions, they would have shared interests and passions and goals. It could have been good. They would have fed each other's fires, made each other grow bigger and brighter. Maybe. Guillaume hadn't been willing to give. He hadn't cared about Enjolras' fire, hadn't cared how big or bright he was, as long as he was provided what Guillaume wanted. Their marks had said they belonged together, had proclaimed their love for each other, but had Guillaume ever actually cared to try? Had he ever actually made the choice to love Enjolras?

And Enjolras wanted to believe there was a better type of love out there, somewhere. He wanted to believe Cosette's words were true, and that there could be a love of choice, of being there for each other and also for yourself.

He wanted to believe he could love someone that saw him at his worst and wasn't disgusted or inconvienced, but determined to stand with him until he found his fire again, to shelter him and warm him and protect him until he could take care of himself. He wanted to believe that didn't make him dirty and wrong, just because he found that somewhere other than at the end of a cosmic mark on his flesh.

Immediately, he knew what he needed to do. Casting Cosette an apologetic look, he was already fumbling for his phone. “I... I need to make send a text. Do you mind?”

She just smiled at him and shook her head.

Enjolras' fingers hovered over his phone. He could feel Cosette watching him, but there was no weight to it. Curiosity, maybe, but she wasn't pushing him one way other another with her gaze; this was his choice. _I think love, real love, is just... caring about someone, and wanting them to be happy and knowing that they want you to be happy to. I think it's taking the time to help each other and taking care of each other. I think... I think it feels warm_. Enjolras doesn't really know if it's possible to love someone other than your soulmate. He doesn't even know if it's possible for someone like him to love. But he knows he needs someone right now. Not the desperate need of before, where it felt like his world was falling apart but simply the desire to have someone enter a warm spot in his heart – not a hollow spot, not a missing half waiting to be filled, but simply a room in his heart that had room for a guest.

He typed out, _I was going to meet with Guillaume. I decided not to. I'm having tea with a girl. Would you join me?_ He hesistated. Breathed. He didn't know if he could do this... no. That was the old pattern, the one he'd been trapped in, doubting, helpless, hurt. He could do it, because he already had, with Cosette. He kept typing, gave the address of the coffee shop he was originally supposed to meet Guillaume in. _I think I'm ready to talk about what happened. If anyone else is free. I_

Another pause. He could feel his eyes watering but he forced it back.

_I miss everyone_.

Grantaire typed back: _I'm coming_.

-

When Enjolras left the tea shop, it was with Cosette at his side. He had tried to tell her she didn't need to be here for this, but there was a strange light in her eyes. No, she would stay with him.

Make sure he's okay.

He didn't have to do this alone.

He marched into the coffee shop; it helped that Cosette's hand had grabbed his at some point because it kept his from shaking when he saw Guillaume – and worse, when he saw Guillaume see him.

There was a moment of relief on Guillaume's face when he first noticed Enjolras, and then a dark fury, one that made the prickle of panic appear in Enjolras' lungs. Then came shock, confusion, and an even deeper anger when he saw Enjolras standing with a strange girl, hand in hand.

“What's this?” Guillaume asked when Enjolras walked up to the table Guillaume was seated at.

Enjolras ignored the comment and took a deep, steadying breath. Cosette gave his hand a reassuring squeeze before letting go and taking a step back, giving him the space to step forward on his own, to make that choice. He did so, knowing she was standing there, watching. “Guillaume, we need to talk about what you did to me. And about what's happening now.”

Guillaume tried for a confident smile, but Enjolras knew Guillaume, had learnt to read the minitea of his expressions out of self-defense. He knew he wasn't as sure of himself as he'd like Enjolras to believe.

“Ange, I haven't seen you in ages,” Guillaume simpered. “I just want to catch up with your right now, make sure you're okay. That other stuff, it's not important right now–”

Like a snake, Guillaume's hand shot out, latching onto Enjolras' free hand. Terror prickled up his spine ( _broad fingers holding his wrists to the sheets, anchoring there agianst the push-push-push_ –) He breathed, like Grantaire had taught him. Enjolras pulled back. Guillaume's hand was still around his wrist but he had stepped back. Not cringing back out of fear, not running, simply taking step. Decided. Insistent.

“No,” Enjolras said.

No, not _said_. It was too loud for _said_. Not yelling either but – this was not a hushed voice, it was not one to be ignored. It held the stirrings of an anger that too often now struggled to light.

“No, why is talking about _us_ always _unimportant_ when _I'm_ the one that needs to talk. This feels important to me, Guillaume!” He almost says _you're important to me_ but it was out of habit, old and empty now. In some ways, he supposes, there is still some truth in it; Guillaume is important to him in the same way a fall that breaks your arm is important. It happened and it hurt and it had an impact on your life. But also in the same way that a fall no longer looks so important after the fact, not when compared to the importance of healing.

“What's important?”

Even though Enjolras had known they were coming, his heart nearly jumps out of his chest with dread. Witnesses. People to see what he had become, the monster he was, the failure he was, he can't, _he can't–_

Old habits. He can. He asked for this.

The fact that Guillaume looked even more shocked, more scared, was a vicious, hideous joy. People could make fear seem like something beautiful, like a fainting maiden willing to fawn over any hero who took her by her hands and refused to let go. Conviction was ugly and mean, it demanded, it had scales and fangs and didn't lay down, it ate heroes who dared touch it without its permission. Medusa was born from a woman so beautiful she made the gods themselves covet her.

Enjolras turned, and gave Grantaire a shaky smile. With him stood all of them. Combeferre, Courfeyrac, Marius, Feuilly, Bahorel, Joly, Bossuet... he couldn't even believe they were all here, hadn't expected _all_ , surely they had lives, they were busy...

They had chosen to put all that aside because Enjolras had asked for them. They loved him, and they chose to be here for him.

“What's going on?” asked Combeferre, evenly, even like steel, even as a cliff – unyielding.

Guillaume was flushing, flustered. “Nothing. Nothing, I... we were just meeting for coffee. Didn't expect you all to end up here, weird coincidence, right?”

Marius (soft spoken _Marius_ of all people) crossed his arms. “Enjolras said it was important.”

A muscle jumped in Guillaume's jaw as it clenched. “Yeah, well, he doesn't get to have everything his way,” Guillaume snapped. “He was the one that's left me in the lurch for _weeks_. I don't want to talk about this here–”

“Yeah, well I'm tired of hearing what you want, Guillaume. How is it always about you?” said Bahorel, in a tone that seemed to say _how have I never noticed it's always been about you before now_. “I want to hear what _Enjolras_ wants.”

“Oh, because we don't hear enough of that,” huffed Guillaume, not allowing himself to be cowed by Bahorel's looming. “He's always making his demands, always fucking selfish–”

“ _What_?” That was Feuilly. Up until now he had been silent, observing, not yet ready to throw his hat into a ring he was still uncertain about, but now he had heard enough. “Are we talking about the same person? Enjolras is one of the _least_ selfish people I have ever _met_. I mean it,” he added, when he saw Enjolras' wide-eyed look. “You are one of the most generous people I've ever met. Just because you're a good leader doesn't make you selfish – we _choose_ to follow you. Besides, when has Enjolras ever not listened to what others have to say?”

Guillaume wasn't given a chance to answer. This time it was Joly that spoke, “So what _do_ you want?” he pressed, earnest, so so earnest.

And Enjolras... didn't know. He wanted so many things – things that started with him and Guillaume being right for each other and which ended with never seeing Guillaume again. But it meandered so much between there – he wanted to treat his friends right and be loved by them. He wanted to never feel another panic attack, to never to be woken again in the night by nightmares. He wanted to go back to class and only feel stress from his homework. He wanted to attend another Amis meeting – _god_ he wanted to attend another Amis meeting, he'd missed it like a piece had been cut off of him. He wanted to talk to his friends freely and easily again. He wanted for it to not have been Guillaume to have taken all of that away from him.

“I want...” he started, and then Guillaume's hand, the one that had been resting this entire time around Enjolras' wrist, constricted.

Every nerve in his body lit up. That was a warning. That was telling him to stop screaming, to take it, to be good, to be a proper soulmate, to stop embarrassing, to _stop stop stop, be small, be quiet, wait for it to end, you're going to be punished, you were bad, you–_

“No!” He tore away from Guillaume with enough force that it made his wrist burn from where Guillaume's hand was torn away from it. And now Enjolras was standing fully back. Nothing anchored him anymore, and he tried not to feel adrift as he stood between his soulmate and his friends.

No, he wasn't adrift. The people behind him weren't a sea for him to get lost in, they were a shore waiting for him to return. A glance and he saw their eyes on him, waiting, for his word. Not being bullied by him, not being forced to listen to his proclamations like he was some sort of king, but simply being _good friends_ and waiting to hear _him_. They looked strong. Defiant. They were at his back. He saw Grantaire's thunderous, murderous face, darting between him and Guillaume, he saw the pent up violence – protection – wound up in his body.

Grantaire chose over and over again to put what Enjolras needed first. Enjolras didn't know if that was love. But he did know that it was warm.

When Medusa was hurt she was given fangs.

_No, not hurt._ That what they kept calling it – that's what _he_ kept calling it. He had been “hurt”. But hurt was scraping your knees when you learnt to ride a bike. Hurt was watching one of your best friends fall in love with his soulmate and being afraid you'd be left behind. Hurt was hearing Grantaire's dead, derisive words hits too close to home during an ABC meeting. _Hurt_ could be healed, could be accidental or inconsequential and could be fixed by the very person that had caused it. This, _this_ was not that.

“You _raped me_ ,” Enjolras said.

At first, desperately, immediately, he wanted to take it back, to have never said it. He heard the sounds of shock, horror, disbelief behind him, could only imagine the faces of his friends, could only imagine what they were thinking, their judgements – after all, how could you be raped by your soulmate? – but he didn't take it back, not for a second. Because in front of him Guillaume had been turned to stone.

In that moment, something ended. And something began. There would be a long journey from this point, and he knew it. And yet, he wasn't struck by the crushing fear of the infinite tomorrows as he had been when he had been curled up in Courfeyrac's room. He had enough experience by now to know it would be easy, but he also knew he would survive it. Other people already had – _he_ already had, every day.

A hand landed on his shoulder. Enjolras didn't have to turn to know it was Grantaire; it was warm, but light, giving him space to shake it off or step away if that was what Enjolras needed. That was also something that was just beginning – what it was Enjolras didn't know, and he wasn't really in a place to make that sort of decision, not yet. But it was something.

And with that, and his friends behind him, it was enough, for now. He would be able to choose when he wanted more.

So he faced down Guillaume and Enjolras felt something inside him unfurl, a part of him that had been so cramped and scared and aching was finally given space to rise once more, and to Guillaume Enjolras _spoke_.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND THERE WE GO. IT TOOK YEARS BUT WE GOT THERE.  
> I hope it was satisfying, I really really really hope it was worth the wait.
> 
> So thanks to all of you that managed to wait this out, and all the people that left comments that kept me going, especially those that kept popping up during the Endless Hiatus to remind me that, wow, somehow there are still people that want to know how this ends.  
> It all ended up getting a little warped and condensed from my original plan, purely because i wanted an ending and this was the only way to make it end, but it's mostly true to my original plan.
> 
> If you want an epilogue, imagine Grantaire carefully designing a tattoo that works around Enjolas' mark so that it completely disguises the words. That way Enjolras can replace it with something positive, that reminds him of his friends, his support, and his own strength rather than that trashbag. The epilogue, if it had been written, would, yes, have also included Grantaire and Enjolras going on a date ;) but it takes them both quite a while to get to a point where they're both stable and secure enough to try dating so I wasn't able to fit it into the main body of the story like I had originally hoped to.
> 
> Anyways, thanks one last time for the awesome ride you all took with me, I experienced a lot and changed a lot over the course of this story and it meant a lot to have written it.
> 
> (also I haven't done too much les mis stuff lately, but you can find me over on tumblr as well, either on my art blog @benevolenterrancy or my main @carriagelamp :D /self-advertising)
> 
> Cheers <3


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